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Panache has committed his life to travelling the world carrying this divine energy to people of all nationalities, all religious beliefs and ideologies. He has activated thousands of people through his divine presence. He is a vehicle of profound peace, love and light.

Joseph of Arimathea:

The group of pilgrims made their way up a hill; they were so happy at this joyful task they were undertaking and there was much talk and laughter now and again.

The group of a few stopped, others had gone on ahead, but as the young woman looked at a particular statue to which she was drawn, she knew without doubt it was Joseph of Arimathea.

She looked at the statue with love and devotion, lost in a kind of meditative contemplation, unaware of what was going on around her.

All of a sudden she had a huge shock, albeit joyous to her system, as – still looking at the Statue of Joseph of Arimathea, it suddenly CAME TO LIFE, and she was looking at this Great Being from history.

It was like a Thunderbolt, so awesome and powerful was the experience, a happening not like anything else she had experienced, and she had had some very special and meaningful ones.

Joseph of Arimathea looked straight at her – she lost count of how long – she was in another time and place, which later when away from her spiritual friends and companions, she remembered Atlantis.  He was Beloved of The Most High and she served in the Temple, and became a much valued and loved person.

Later in Jerusalem, he played an essential and vital role in the life of Jesus, and, his assistance was invaluable after the death of Jesus.

She was only too aware of the part Joseph of Arimathea had played in her life during that incarnation, and it was indeed, one of her most treasured lives, for the great love and spirituality which was, and for those spiritual jewels, which were forever blessed deep within her soul.

Yet again, Glastonbury, he too, played his special part.  All such special and spiritual lives shared together, so that as she had looked at this Great Being whose statue, she knew it was, within that short time-frame as so often during her life, she knew this being had walked side by side with her, throughout so many lives, and would, in Dimensions and Worlds not yet known.

The Lineage of theirs, had its Origins Long Ago, and nothing would or could ever erase what was and would always be, throughout Life and Eternity.

Today he still stands there – upon the Planes of Love and Light, ready to offer his great assistance, which, with that love, affinity and attunement, is open to all, not just to that woman, standing in front of that Great Being all those years ago.

Time does not dim, inner memories are always there, nothing can take away those Great Bonds of Love and Highest Devotion – it is a  Never Ending Line, stretching to Eternity and Beyond – into Future Worlds still to Come.

The woman carried on with her spiritual search – in the many years since that Statue of Joseph of Arimathea came to life, and often in quiet moments, remembered much, that was to all intents and purposes hidden from history.

For much has happened and rests upon the Akasha, those Akashic Records, not all can read, but as the years go on, more and more will.

Joseph of Arimathea has had so many deeply essential lives lived, where his light affected others, raising their consciousness and attunement to the Highest Spiritual Realms, where memories have so often been awoken, remembrance has taken place, for Joseph of Arimathea has always had a most special task to undertake throughout the different Centuries, which had been Foretold in Prophecies so Long Ago, going back to Atlantis and that Golden Age in the Dawn of Time.

For Joseph of Arimathea was truly a Priest of The Most High in Atlantis.  His Priesthood stretched far and wide throughout the Land, for all who lived there, felt Beloved of Joseph of Arimathea, and The Father-Mother-God-Son, when the people lived as One.

They drew breath from the Great Being known then to all, for never were they far from him at all.

Today, as it has always been through the aeons of time, many people have that great love and affinity to this Mighty Being, and as Vibrations are raised, old, forgotten memories begin to surface, and long ago promises and lives so often shared, seep into many peoples’ consciousness, as the Way Back Home Becomes Ever More Clear.

Those steps back to The Father are joyously undertaken, and at each new Frontier of Knowledge and Memories Realised, that Key of Eternity is further Turned, whereupon those Vistas shine with Golden Sunlight, as the Holy Grail is seen again.

The Pilgrim has once again Returned Home, to a Planet other than Earth, and joyous is the welcome received to the one who has returned;  past, present, future, are all rolled into one magnificent memory and awareness, as the Pilgrim comes into the Radiance of The Creator once again, in ways long forgotten, but so lovingly remembered here.

Pat Grabham

4 September, 2012.

British artist Simon Beck creates the huge patterns on frozen lakes in Les Arcs, France

These snowy 'crop circles' look like they took ages to create.

No chance, then, that the imprints were made by alien lifeforms leaving behind remarkable patterns for us to gaze at.

Instead, they are the work of a lone artist who has spent up to ten hours a day trudging around a French ski resort.

The intricate patterns are huge - some span the equivalent size of six football pitches.

Out of this world: A giant artwork created by British artist Simon Beck on a frozen lake using only his feet in Les Arcs, France

Spectacular: Some of the large designs span the size of six football pitches

Resort: Mr Beck creates the patterns while wearing snowshoes

Huge: Each pattern is crafted by Mr Beck alone in the skiing town of Les Arcs, where he lives during winter

They are created by British artist Simon Beck while wearing snowshoes and come in a range of designs from snowflakes and spirals to cubes and more abstract creations.

Each pattern is crafted by Mr Beck alone in the skiing town of Les Arcs, in the French Alps, where he lives during winter.

And he uses an orienteering compass to create the perfect geometric designs.

Mr Beck, an orienteer leader, has created hundreds of the artworks after ploughing his first at Christmas in 2004. 

He uses what he describes as a 'kind of reverse orienteering' to plot his intricate paths before walking along the route in a pair of snowshoes.

He said: 'The main reason for making them was because I can no longer run properly due to problems with my feet, so plodding about on level snow is the least painful way of getting exercise.

'Gradually, the reason has become photographing them, and I am considering buying a better camera.'

Natural shelter: Mr Beck has created hundreds of the artworks after ploughing his first at Christmas in 2004

Doubling up: Mr Beck uses what he describes as a 'kind of reverse orienteering' to plot his intricate paths before walking along the route in a pair of snowshoes

Popular with tourists: More of Mr Beck's work can be seen on his Facebook page

Painstaking: Two admirers are rendered tiny by the vast ice sculpture

More of Mr Beck's work can be seen on his Facebook page at www.facebook.com/snowart8848

Mr Beck, who studied Engineering Science at Oxford University, said many of his patterns can equal the effort needed to climb halfway up Mont Blanc, he said.

He added: 'I usually keep at it until I get too tired, using a headlamp if it gets dark first. It takes typically until I can't go on, but that can depend.

'The setting-out serves as the warm-up then the real training is completing the design. Once this second stage is started, I put on my personal stereo.'

Swirling star: Mr Beckl aid many of his patterns can equal the effort needed to climb halfway up Mont Blanc

Unique: The higher the viewpoint, the better the artworks look

Ice cool: Mr Beck's art proves a treat for cable car users

Decorative: Mr Beck's snow art has become an annual treat for locals and holidaymakers

Intricate: The designs are incredibly complicated considering they are created by a man walking around

Unmissable: Many people travel from miles around to get a look at Mr Beck's work

Precise: Mr Beck has honed his unique art over the last eight years

Proud: The artist poses in front of on of his giant creations

Your Hearts Contain Every Ray Of the Fires of Creation
Yael and Doug Powell

Beloved ones, I Am always here to remind you of all that you are, especially to bring you the remembrance of your hearts, that you might reclaim the fullness of Love. Your hearts contain every ray of the fires of Love, every expression of the creative power of God, every increment of the awakening of consciousness and every bit of it is here in you now, blazing forth to bring new life.

Just as the sun brings life unto the world, so do your hearts bring life to Creation, that everything the rays of life that are your heart touch is brought to life in magnificent ways, responding to the fires of Love. Your hearts, beloved ones, contain all of it, and every ray of Love that is the truth of you now shining is meant to be a source of glorious creation, of bringing new life out of the essence of this endless life we share.

Every moment you are alive to the mystery and the wonder and the power of this experience. So, beloved ones, what will you bring alive with the rays of your fiery hearts now? The whole of Creation is in you and in this moment, you are blessed to feel this life exploding in you, to let it be the power, the beauty and the joy by which you live.

Every ray of the fires of Love that stream forth now from the center of your being can touch the new seeds of creative energy everywhere and bring them forth instantly into breathtaking manifestations of the exquisite expressions of God.

What will your heart bring alive? And will you use these powers of creation that are in you to touch this world and to bring to life expressions of the Love that is the only truth? Will your hearts be available now, as this fiery Love, as the power of Creation, to unfreeze the frozen Love in the world and make it viable again?

What will your heart bring to life and can you allow this fire free reign? Can you trust the fires of Love to consume the resistance, the restrictiveness of ego, that you might be the fuel by which the truth of life emerges into view? Can you allow yourself to burn as the Moment of Creation, to be the great pulse of the awakening of consciousness, to include in this energy the inspiration that is the discoveries of the power of Love? And will you allow the exploration of what the rays of Creation mean that are blazing forth as you, now?

To do this requires commitment, requires decision, and requires the space to allow this remembrance, to burn up the cocoon, the chrysalis of the ego that the Moment of Creation can be free to appear as you, blazing forth in all this glory.

Your hearts contain every ray of the fires of Love … the power and life, the blessing and mystery, the wonder and the miracle and the ecstasy of exploding Love bringing forth brand new ways of seeing things, of living, as the exultant awakening heart of God, that every moment that you live is the moment of bringing life into this wholeness, this hologram, the Love we share and into, by extension, this world and all that is in it.

One touch, one ray of your heart brings to life every aspect of this hologram of Love that is waiting to come alive, waiting to remember that all is one, one breath and one celebration of all the possibilities of creating something new now.

Come! Feel these rays of living Love that every single aspect of the whole of God is in you and any touch to anything brings brand new life, brings awakening consciousness and brings the perspective of the hologram, the oneness. Also, your heart ignites unheard of possibilities for creation itself has never been imagined. It is a total surprise. It is the consumption by fire of every old perspective of the living whole of God. It is the birth of new consciousness. And it is the ignition of the holographic awakening of the ecstasy of Love.

Beloved ones, how will you use your hearts? What fires of life will you ignite now? Will you embrace this energy and let it make of you a blazing comet that shines the way to something new, to a deeper experience of life and to the unified awakening of the heart of God, as every aspect of Creation’s fire bursts forth now to know itself in you.

Will the rays of your fiery heart ignite the world in glory, bring forth the seeds of Love in what seemed like barren ground? Nothing can resist the powers of Creation. These rays of living Light, the essences of God you are, always will bring forth new life to everything you touch.

As your hearts are given free reign to become the torch of Love, to become this power, this energy, that which is the fuel of every new creation will bring you your ability to see the whole in every part and to apply Creation’s power to light up every essence of the endless truth of God that is right here now.

Every choice for Love brings you this remembrance and every ray of your glorious heart releases the world from the reversal, awakens the frozen consciousness of living Love I Am, brings forth life in all the world, blesses the Earth and restores this Creation to the limitless power and grace of Love.

Beloved ones, please allow your heart to show you the truth, to awaken your consciousness into the glory of all of the Light and the life and the power, that every ray of Love that shines as you is life-giving, creator, wondrous and blessing All That Is.

Your hearts contain every ray of the fires of Love. Can you begin to sense how much Love this is? Can you allow yourself to feel the explosion of life that you are, embracing and encompassing this world as the Moment of Creation “en–conscious-ed,” acknowledged, rejoiced in, celebrated, and used by the Will of Love to bring warmth and Love to the Earth – to restore the heart of humanity to the fullness of this power and grace, to the fullness of joy and blessing, to the fullness of discovery of what is Real and what it is that Love is creating right here and right now.

As you become the expression of the Will of Love, as you allow your heart to take over, you can consciously extend each unique ray of Love to enliven and bring to life specific things, to bring forth the creations that you are here to manifest and to gift to humankind your unique expression of the powerful Moment of Creation here and now.

You can come to be the awakening of life so fully acknowledged and alive, that everything that you touch sprouts like a seed in the sun. Everywhere you are is a birth of new aspects of Love. Everything you breathe is restored to this energy of God and every moment you are alive in the wholeness and the wonder of Creation.

The Moment of Creation is now. You are this Moment of grand life exploding, brought forth to touch this life, this world, this awakening to the Real of Love in humanity, and this purpose is ignited by the rays of Love that are your heart. In this moment, everything is restored.

Can you imagine how it feels when the Will of Love moves within you to feel your heart bring forth a brand new creation that can completely change the world? Can you feel the full potential of bringing the fires of Creation itself to bear on the needs of humanity, on the quest for the awakening of Love, igniting the remembrance of each heart’s perfection and bringing forth the reflections of the pure heart of God in the symbols of life in the world?

Not only the symbols of plentitude, but the symbol and the feel of pure energy, of the fires of life that can consume all hearts’ beliefs in other than the truth that only Love is Real. Can you feel not only the potential but that which is already underway as the fiery rays of Love you are continue to ignite this remembrance of humanity as the living whole of Love in which the world is brought forth right now as Love’s perfection.

Let Me not only open your heart to its full capacity, beyond every possibility of the mind to comprehend… But allow Me to restore your faith that the energies of Creation create only good, only Love, and everything is possible in you and through your heart…new life, new experiences, new abundance and the food of God, the pure energy of endless Love awakening in celebration in your hearts now.

Extend the rays of Love you are! Touch what your heart now calls you to, and feel this great ignition that blasts through every boundary, sets you free to be that which warms the world, that which frees this energy of God that is serving the dream of other than Love.

Let Me use your hearts to ignite very specific things, to create the pattern of humanity’s awakening to this truth, this wonder, this fire of Love that is in and as your heart this moment. Warm the garden of this world with the sunshine of your hearts, that the seeds of Love may sprout and grow instantly and amaze you, and take these fires of Love… let them consume all limitations and set you free to be this fiery Love extending, uniquely, harmonically paired with every need for freedom.

Every ray of your heart is directed and calibrated to answer Love’s call, to wake up the seeds that are ready, to ignite these very streams of life in other hearts that are ready, until every heart is free to be the rays of Love’s creation, to consume every heart’s belief in lack or limitation and to ignite the truth in the one heart of humankind.

You can feel these rays of Love now being extended and your heart will know the purpose of each and every one. In your embrace of the truth, you are ignited also, that you might show the way Home.

Circle of Light have been given the gift of the Messages from God to bring forth to humanity through Yael and Doug Powell. We hope that you will share these Messages as widely as possible, including to any groups or lists you feel appropriate. We only ask that you retain our identifying information. © 2012 Circle of Light www.circleoflight.net

Through the unified efforts of Heaven and Earth, we have successfully birthed a Renaissance of Divine Love on this Planet. Now, through the unprecedented Solar frequencies of Transfiguring Divine Love which are flowing into the mental and emotional strata of Earth, every person’s I AM Presence is initiating the process of transforming our carbon-based bodies into Crystalline-based Solar Light Bodies of Infinite Perfection. This is a critical factor in our Ascension process.

At this very moment, there is a Divine Alchemy occurring within the physical, etheric, mental, and emotional bodies of each and every one of us. This Divine Alchemy is occurring at an atomic cellular level not only within Humanity’s bodies, but in the physical, etheric, mental, and emotional strata of Mother Earth as well. It is hard to fathom what the success of this phase of the Divine Plan will mean for Humanity, but the Beings of Light said it will enable us to reverse the adverse affects of our fall from Grace. These affects include the aging of our bodies, disease, degeneration, mental and emotional illness, and even death as we know it. These affects also include poverty and lack and limitation of every kind, inclement weather conditions, plagues, famines, and pestilence. All of which have perpetuated the maladies of war, greed, the abuse of power, and immeasurable pain and suffering for both Humanity and Mother Earth.

The prophets of old told us about a future day on a New Earth when there would be no such thing as poverty, war, disease, aging, or any of the other gross mutations that Humanity miscreated either deliberately or inadvertently after the fall. What they did not tell us is how this transformation would occur. That is because the process involved was beyond the comprehension of their 3rd-Dimensional finite minds. Consequently, people began to surmise how Earth’s miraculous transformation would occur. Because we had been manipulated by our human egos into believing that we were worthless sinners and worms in the dust, we came to the erroneous conclusion that the only way such an event could happen is if someone came and saved us. The problem with that theory is that Humanity created the maladies existing on Earth through the misuse of our creative faculties of thought and feeling and our gift of free will. Therefore, we alone are responsible for transmuting those human miscreations back into Light. Not even our Father-Mother God will interfere with our free will choices.

There have been wondrous Adepts and Avatars who have come to show us the path of Divine Love that will lead us through this transformational process, but NO ONE can do this for us. The entire Company of Heaven is standing in readiness awaiting the opportunity to help us, but they cannot intervene without our permission. Once we make the Heart Call and ask for their assistance however, the floodgates of Heaven will open and the Beings of Light will amplify our efforts a thousand times a thousandfold.

Now, as we move toward the quantum shifts up the Spiral of Evolution that will take place December 12, 2012—12:12:12, and December 21st, 2012—the December Solstice, the Beings of Light in the Realms of Illumined Truth are revealing to us the greatest need of the hour. The Divine Plan is that now, since a Renaissance of Divine Love has been birthed on Earth, we have the potential of Ascending into frequencies of the 5th Dimension that will transcend our Human miscreations. This means that with the influx of Light that will occur during the celestial alignments in December, the Earth and all Life evolving upon her have the capability of transforming our physical realities much, much sooner than what seems possible from outer appearances.

The Company of Heaven said the KEY to this greatly accelerated Transfiguration involves two things. The first is Humanity’s willingness to consciously and deliberately participate in the Divine Alchemy of transforming our carbon-based cells into the crystalline-based cells of our Solar Light Bodies. The second thing we have to accomplish is more complicated.

That critical facet of the Divine Plan involves assisting Mother Earth with the Divine Alchemy of transforming her carbon-based cells into the crystalline-based cells of her Solar Light Bodies. This can only be accomplished by healing the schism that still exists to some degree between Humanity and the Elemental Kingdom.

The Elemental Kingdom is the Divine Intelligence within the primal Light substance that forms the earth, air, water, fire, and ether elements that make up ALL physical matter, including our four Earthly Bodies and those of Mother Earth. Most of Humanity does not even realize that there is Divine Intelligence in matter. In fact, millions of people are still functioning with the distorted belief that our fragmented and fear-based human egos conjured up. That is the belief that the Earth is an inanimate object that is to be used and abused as Humanity chooses. The deadly problem with that belief is that NOTHING COULD BE FARTHER FROM THE TRUTH! All over the world we are painfully experiencing the results of that erroneous thinking. All we have to do is observe the dramatic events taking place involving the weather: pollution, droughts, famines, earthquakes, volcanos, hurricanes, tornados, wild fires, tsunamis, floods, typhoons, and all other expressions of inclement weather that are wreaking havoc in people’s lives.

The Elemental Kingdom is responsible for outpicturing Humanity’s thoughts, feelings, words, actions, beliefs, and behavior patterns in the physical world of form. The Divine Intent of this selfless service is to allow us to experience in a tangible way the results of what we are cocreating. This means that what is occurring on Earth at this time in relation to the elements and the physical, etheric, mental, and emotional strata of Mother Earth is merely A REFLECTION OF HUMANITY’S CONSCIOUSNESS.

The HOPEFUL news is that since that is the case, you and I and the rest of Humanity have the ability to change the negative things that are occurring on Earth. This can be easily accomplished by changing what we are cocreating through our thoughts, feelings, words, actions, beliefs, and behavior patterns, in other words, by raising our consciousness.

Since time is short and the need is great, the Company of Heaven is asking embodied Humanity to redouble our efforts and to intensify our Lightwork. To help us remember the sacred knowledge we all clearly understood prior to this embodiment, the Beings of Light have compiled a complex overview of how Humanity lost awareness of the Elemental Kingdom and what we must do to heal that relationship. In this amazing overview they also reveal the incredible Divine Intervention that has taken place over the past few decades in order to remind awakening Humanity about these Beings who have so selflessly volunteered to assist us in learning to be cocreators during our Earthly Sojourn. The Company of Heaven also clearly reveals the profound Truth that our Ascension into the 5th-Dimensional Realms of Infinite Perfection cannot occur without Humanity’s cooperation with the Elemental Kingdom.

The Beings of Light are also giving us powerful visualizations and activities of Light that will allow us to consciously and deliberately participate in the Divine Alchemy of transforming our carbon-based cells into the crystalline-based cells of our Solar Light Bodies. All of this information is flowing into the mental and emotional strata of Earth and is readily available to anyone who is willing to lift up in consciousness and listen to his or her heart. Ask your I AM Presence to reveal to you your part of this Divine Plan and respond according to your Heart’s Call.

In addition to our individual endeavors in this exceptionally important facet of the Divine Plan, we are being asked to serve as surrogates on behalf of our sisters and brothers around the world who are so buried in the painful circumstances of their lives that they cannot raise their heads above the negativity enough to perceive the urgency of the hour or the need to invoke the Light for themselves.

The wonderful thing about volunteering to serve as a surrogate on behalf of ALL Humanity is that there is no separation! Consequently, every call we make for our sisters and brothers effects our own lives in powerful and positive ways. As we are lifted up they are lifted up, and as they are lifted up we are lifted up. This is truly a win-win situation of the greatest magnitude.

For more than 40 years the Legions of Light in the Realms of Illumined Truth have asked those of us associated with the New Age Study of Humanity’s Purpose to document, for the benefit of all Humanity, the information being given to us from On High. We have made this information freely available to anyone who is interested through decades of free classes and myriad meditation groups. We also share this information without charge through our website, our monthly e-mail newsletters, free seminars, a weekly radio program, webinars, teleseminars, and YouTube presentations. In addition to all of the things we offer for FREE, the Beings of Light have asked us to also produce CDs, DVDs, Books, MP3s and Celestial Art that will help people to add to the Light of the world in additional ways.

The Beings of Light explained that the advantage of thousands of people listening to the same CD and invoking, in exactly the same way every time, the powerful tools, visualizations, information, meditations, and affirmations they have given to Humanity the thoughtforms being invoked build in momentum quickly and exponentially.

Of course, our individual invocations are also powerful, but if thousands of people are doing their own thing and each one is giving a different variation of the invocations, the thoughtforms change every time and they are not able to build in momentum as quickly, as powerfully, or as effectively.

For this reason, the Company of Heaven has requested that we make a set of two CDs available for anyone who is interested in assisting Humanity with the two critical facets of the Divine Plan that reflect the greatest need of the hour between now and December 21, 2012, according to the information from On High.

The first CD contains the amazing overview from the Beings of Light that is designed to help us remember the sacred knowledge of how Humanity lost awareness of the Elemental Kingdom, and what we must do now to heal our relationship with these selfless servants of Humanity and our Father-Mother God. This CD also addresses the critical facet of the Divine Plan that is necessary in order for us to assist Mother Earth with the Divine Alchemy of transforming her carbon-based cells into the crystalline-based cells of her Solar Light Bodies. In addition, it reveals the amazing Divine Intervention that has taken place, up to this point, to heal the schism between Humanity and the Elemental Kingdom.

The second CD contains very powerful invocations, meditations, visualizations, and other activities of Light that will help each of us to consciously and deliberately participate in the Divine Alchemy of transforming our carbon-based cells into the crystalline-based cells of our Solar Light Bodies. As we God Victoriously accomplish this for ourselves, we will simultaneously assist the I AM Presence of every man, woman, and child to do this for themselves in alignment with his or her Divine Plan and the highest good for all concerned.

Because of the importance of this phase of the Divine Plan, the Beings of Light asked me to record these two CDs on June 5, 2012 during the last phase of the Venus Transit. I did just that with the Divine Intention of encoding the powerful frequencies of Divine Love from the Venus Transit into every word recorded on the CDs. The Company of Heaven asked us to make these CDs available AFTER the successful birthing of our Renaissance of Divine Love. That way, the I AM Presence of every person on Earth would be capable of integrating the influx of Light from the powerful tools and information encoded on the CDs.

If you have the Heart Call to serve as an Instrument of God on behalf of ALL Humanity, as well as Mother Earth and ALL Life evolving upon her, these CDs are now available on our website. You may download them as MP3s or order the physical CDs and we will mail them to you. You may also order the CDs by mailing or faxing in the order form at the bottom of this e-mail.

Divine Alchemy
We Are Becoming Crystalline Light Beings
by Patricia Cota-Robles

(a set of two CDs)

The MP3s are $20.00 or the CDs are $27.00 plus postage and handling

To order this set of 2 CDs for yourself or as gifts for your friends and loved ones, you may do so from our SECURE WEBSITE SHOPPING CART:

http://eop.mybigcommerce.com/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdIzv--7PhA&feature=em-subs_digest

We await your arrival at your own surprise party. – Michael channeled by Ron Head

Today I wish to speak with you as one lifelong friend to another. It is very important for each of you to make the determination to stay in your center and maintain control of your emotions as the next week of cosmic and solar energies blast through. You may feel very unusually unstable at times. Things which you assumed you had long ago dealt with may arise in your lives. Just observe the remnants of these energies as they leave you forever. Even memories of them need not bother you from this point on.

Realize, however, that choice is involved. It must be your choice to have done with them. Realize also that there were important lessons involved and search in your heart for gratitude both for the lesson and for the blessing of its departure. Thank the Forever Being that you are for reaching this point and allowing you this opportunity.

The departure from your lives of these things will create the space necessary for you to replace them. Give thought to which personal attributes you wish to grow or acquire. In the meantime, you cannot go astray by breathing in all of the unconditional love of the Creator that you can imagine. Find every tiny corner of your being and pack it full of love. Every You which you have experienced will gladly accept more love. The potential persons which you have wished for, or imagined, may be waiting for more of this love to energize them.

This is the true power of prayer, dear ones, creation as it is done moment to moment, but with intention. Create yourselves as you will be in the next moment. Create the next moment itself.

Also, may we point out that, from this point forward, it will be very beneficial to you if you daily make every effort to maintain your calm as things appear to run amuck around you. Many things which have always been a part of your daily lives are going to disappear in short order, having reached the end of their usefulness. It will be very easy for panic to set in, and you will see this in others. We have asked you to prepare yourselves to be calm centers of reason in these times. You have very likely had to do that in your own personal lives. Having learned how to do that, it is now your opportunity to provide this calm for others. Nothing more may be required than your peaceful presence.

Your energy fields are affecting more than you know at this time. You have felt the changes in yourselves and they continue now, and in fact, will increase. Those reading these messages are the ones who have chosen to lead the way. There may be some who are teachers; however, most will simply need to be examples. This is the most effective form of teaching, after all.

We ask you to visit once more the visions of yourselves which you have imagined and held during this next week. You are being given the energy to bring these things into what you term your realities. The reality is, in fact, that they exist already, but polish them up a bit, as you will begin to see more of them in your day-to-day lives. As you learn that you are, in truth, creating these things for yourselves, you will find that the span of time you have granted yourselves between thought and manifestation will become less necessary. The control you have needed to keep from instantly creating whatever you may have thought of was actually a gift. Understanding the process will teach you to maintain that control for yourselves.

The joy and freedom you are so close to experiencing is beginning to be felt by some of you. That is the unidentified feeling which you are trying so hard to ‘put a finger on’. It is the knowledge of the Self that you are very close to home. Congratulations, dear friends. We await your arrival at your own surprise party.

Again we urge you to feel our presence around you. We shall continue to be with you in each moment. Good day.

Copyright © Ronald Head.

Beloved masters, there has been much discussion about the right and left brain integration of humankind as part of the evolutionary ascension process. It is important that you understand that as long as you are in the vibrational fields of duality or separation, you will not totally unify the right and left brain areas of expression. However, when you tap into your Sacred Mind, which is located at the upper, back portion of the head, you will tap into a fifth-dimensional environment where there is unity consciousness. In that etheric area of the brain, all is unified; there is no separation. The Goddess-inspired right brain is forever seeking loving, emotional interaction and creative expression via the Soul’s consciousness. The left brain, masculine mind is more interested in concrete facts established via the material plane of consciousness, which creates a push/pull duality consciousness. Your Soul and Higher Self function within a reality of no time or space limitations, while the ego consciousness is limited by time and structural boundaries. The Divine blueprint/plan of the past and present is quickly coming to a conclusion. The experimental experience of duality and separation is either being modified, harmonized, integrated or eliminated.

You cannot judge that which occurs in the negative arena of duality without stepping out of the narrow path of balance, thus placing yourself in the scene of action you are judging as immoral or bad. Remember, the ego-mind is entrapped in the denser levels of polarity, and judgment is a result of a polarized mind. There are vibrating energy fields of consciousness within every dimensional level which will always accommodate and validate a person’s state of awareness. Low level vibrations weaken the physical body, for there is less Light / Life Force energy available.

You must continuously endeavor to control your ego-desire body personality. Your third- / fourth-dimensional existence is an altered-state of consciousness–a diminished state–which represents only a very small portion of your powerful and magnificent Divine Self. In the beginning stages of Self-awareness, the control of the ego-personality is very strong. Your desire and willingness to follow the nudgings of the Soul Self must be even stronger. As the path of righteousness grows more narrow, you must strive for the highest choices in all decisions.

Those of you who are firmly on the Path of Light are clearing not only all of the distorted negative energy stored within your physical vessel but also any lower astral plane energy you still have within your auric field. The three lower astral planes hold the collective consciousness belief system. You are disconnecting from and moving beyond that area of influence as you strive to achieve more balanced, harmonious energy patterns. While you are doing so, it is important that you become an observer of the process. You must watch and wait patiently until your opportunity to serve is made very clear to you. You must also adjust your priorities to match your dreams, and you must have faith in yourself and in the Divine Plan that awaits fulfillment. It is an important milestone when the fear of change develops into excitement and anticipation of what the future holds. Are you daring enough to choose the life you yearn for?

As you move higher on the path of illumination, you will no longer be interested in the small dramas of those around you, for you no longer embody the lower frequencies of attachment. Your lofty vantage point of a Self-Master allows you to view the on-going third- / fourth-dimensional drama as an observer–not as a participant.

The beginning process of ascension or raising your vibrational patterns is a critical factor in accessing the higher-dimensional fields of consciousness. First, you reconnect with your physically embodied Soul Self, then with your OverSoul Higher Self and your Etheric Replica, which resides within your personal pyramid of Light. Once you have accomplished these three stages of en-Lighten-ment, you are ready to step onto the fast-track of ascension.

Staying centered within the Sacred Heart / Mind allows spiritual/intellectual growth to accelerate. Every Soul will ultimately tap into their genius potential, which is stored within the Sacred Mind. This treasure trove of wisdom is located in the higher frequency levels of the brain. Genius quotient is the capacity to act and react in an individual, original way through the choices you make. It determines how you adapt to circumstances and how you express your individuality. You are to seek emotional stability and the planes of the higher mind in order to express intelligent love. A Seed Atom of pure Creator Essence resides within your Sacred Heart. Revelations of great import are revealed and your connection with the Source of All becomes more intimate when you begin to feel this Essence of pure love within your Sacred Heart center.

Remember, you magnetize energy to you, and you radiate energy from your Solar Power Center (front and back). As your Energetic Signature becomes more refined and is attuned to the higher frequencies of Light, you will still draw forth a portion of the half-spectrum, Primal Life Force substance as long as you remain in a third- / fourth-dimensional environment. However, it will mix and meld with the higher frequency Adamantine Particles of Light, and will be automatically transformed by your loving intention into higher frequency energy as you align your free will with the Will of our Father/Mother God.

The different-colored, luminescent Rays will assist in integrating and balancing the higher frequency patterns of galactic consciousness. The more you balance, harmonize and strengthen your chakra system, the more Divine Light you will be able to absorb. The spinal column will eventually become a Rod of Light/Power through which the streams of White Fire Essence of the Creator can flow unimpeded, whereby the process of ascension will be greatly accelerated.

The Supreme Creator is pure Love–the ultimate State of Being. Each Divine Spark of Light contains a Seed Atom of undiluted Creator consciousness, the Adamantine Particles of Light. These Sparks of Divinity contain the Love, Divine Will and Wisdom to create everything in existence–past, present or future. This Seed Atom was placed within the center of your Diamond Core God Cell for this Sub-Universal experience. The inner Seed Atom of vision and intuition must be gradually opened and brought into sharp focus. Atoms and molecules are miniature solar systems with a central nucleus and orbiting electrons, but are mostly composed of space. The nucleus and electrons are not solid matter, but forms of energy, energy which takes on form. All shapes and geometric patterns have an energetic signature.

The Supreme Creator has supplied the raw material and the formulas for every imaginable creation. Along with the Elohim creator gods, the angelic realm and the great builders of form, you, as Self-conscious cocreators, were given the command to go forth and create worlds without end. There is a major theme for each Sub-Universal experience; however, the execution of the Divine Plan is left up to the God Parents of each Sub-Universe.

The first impulse as a Divine Spark of individualized consciousness was the WILL/desire to create. Each Divine Spark was /is given a conscious awareness of Self, as well as the creative abilities to manifest within the material planes of consciousness, and the right to choose what to create. However, along with this wondrous gift came the requirement that each Soul must experience Its own creations, whether positive or negative. In the beginning, all new creative endeavors are open-ended. However, after the Divine plan has been played out in all its magnificent variations, the ascension process for en-Lighten-ed Souls is initiated. You are in the midst of one of those extraordinary times.

TIME is defined by units of major and minor pulsations which are sent forth as waves of energetic thought patterns: crystallized seed thoughts that originated within the mind of our Father/Mother God. These waves and pulsations are experienced as periods and cycles of time. They are sent forth as great bursts of Light which radiate forcefully out into the great cosmic womb of space, where they are cradled and nurtured by the loving Essence of our Mother God.

During this critical phase of evolution/ascension, it is imperative that you understand the process of using the universal laws of manifestation so that you may claim and use your cocreative abilities to the fullest. you are being offered a golden opportunity to join the ranks of the great builders of form. therefore, we will give you a review of some of the most important steps of the cocreative process. We suggest that you also review or study the illustrations for building your twelve ray wheel of creation / your personal flower of life that we gave our messenger some time ago. (these illustrations can be found in our study manual: reference and revelation s * glossary and illustrations * rh).

If you have followed our instructions, you have created your Pyramid of Light/Power in the fifth dimension, and you are a regular visitor to the Pyramid of Light which contains a holographic replica of the Earth. Many of you have also joined in creating group pyramids for specific purposes, and you have also created various Pyramids for special projects in order to draw forth the Essence of Creation needed to bring your visions to fruition. Know this: in each one of these pyramids you have left an Etheric Replica of yourself which is constantly integrating the specific geometric patterns of Light needed to create your new reality on Earth, and also to lay the groundwork for your new existence in higher, more refined realms. You are active not only in the physical world; you also have many facets of your God-self in the higher realms with whom you are interacting. Have we not told you that you are becoming multidimensional Beings?

We gave you specific instructions and step-by-step techniques for accessing the frequencies from the City of Light in your area via your personal Pyramid of Light. By practicing the Infinity Breath, you fill your Etheric Replicas and physical vessel with Adamantine Particles / God Particles of Light. We will now refine and add more components to the process.

Have you wondered why, several years ago, we instructed you to “Breathe in Light and breathe out Love” when you go into the World Pyramid with the intention of radiating Love/Light to humanity and the world?

When you breathe in light, you are breathing adamantine particles into your sacred heart. When you breathe out unconditional/sacred love, the adamantine particles of pure god essence are empowered or ignited by your loving intention so that they can be used for the greatest good. You are the receptacle for these god particles, and your love is the activator.

Envision this: during meditation or your quiet time, preferably twice a day, morning and evening, take twelve full Infinity Breaths, and after the twelfth one, pull in your abdomen and hold your breath for a moment or two. Now, as you take the next (or thirteenth) breath (or you may start over at the count of one), see it flowing forth from your Solar Power Center (Sacred Heart Core) into the front of your body. The Infinity pattern is now in a horizontal configuration instead of vertical. On the in-breath, the first flat loop extends outward in front of your body and on the out-breath, the second loop extends from the back of your body, completing the Infinity sign. Breathe in and out SIX INFINITY SIGNS, and as you do, they will automatically create a pattern of twelve loops that completely surround you like the petals of a flower. As you breathe out the last loop, again hold your breath for a moment before returning to normal breathing. Then breathe in and out consciously as you envision the Essence of Creation flowing forth from you out into the world. Also, envision spirals of Light connecting you to the World Pyramid and the multiple Pyramids that you have created in the higher dimensions, thereby sharing your Particles of Love/Light with the world as well as fueling your visions with the Divine Life Force substance of all Creation.

Take a few moments to complete this sacred process by focusing on your Sacred Heart Center so that you may feel the fullness there and the overwhelming love that pours throughout your body. You are now connected to the River of Life, which contains an inexhaustible supply of Adamantine Particles. It is tangible, beloveds. It is real, and it is the most wondrous, blissful feeling you will ever experience while in the earthly vessel, for you are experiencing the pure loving Essence of the Creator.

My brave ones, do not fear the future, for when your heart and intentions are pure, you are sheltered within the radiance and protection of Creator Light. We will not tell you that there will not be stressful times ahead, for you must traverse the path of polarity and duality in order to reach the plateau of peace and harmony. There will always be challenges, lessons and opportunities to expand your consciousness as you integrate more of your Divinity.

Know that the situations or problems that come your way for resolution cannot be solved at the level in which they were created. You must rise above the conflicts of the ego-self and view each situation through a filter of love and from the vantage point of a Self-master. Envision within your mind’s eye a wholeness that has never been distorted, a world that has no imperfections and a radiant, perfected YOU residing in this paradise. It is not a time for the faint of heart, for indecision or denial; for your world is radically changing whether you believe it or not. Isn’t it time to accept the gifts we are offering so that you may move gracefully and joyously into the future? It is our greatest joy and honor to assist and serve you; and never forget, you are loved unconditionally.

I AM Archangel Michael
Transmitted through Ronna Herman

Ariah, Priestess of Osiris.

Question:

(Priestess of Osiris, speak to me – tell me what do you see?)

End of Question.

As a very young child, I asked my parents if I could go into the Order of Osiris.  To them it was an honour – a daughter of theirs who wanted to serve Osiris, Beloved of us.

I had many visits with my parents to the Temple of Osiris, as it was known to a few.

The High Priests and Elders asked me lots of questions and as was the custom going back to Atlantis, what was of special importance was my Aura.  My Ray of Vibration – Note upon the Ether of Light.

As the High Priests and Elders of the Order of Osiris looked into my deep inner self and soul, they decided that yes, being a Priestess of Osiris was the path chosen by my soul long ago in Atlantis.

What was a deciding factor was my Ray of Origin and Aura.  Being born on the Aquamarine Ray and thus having predominantly a Blue Aura, was something of great attunement.

Osiris himself you see is of the Blue Ray of Origin, although Isis, Beloved to Osiris, and the rest of us, in not only in Egypt but Atlantis, was herself born on the Amethyst Ray of Light and Vibration.

Thus the Two Rays, Aquamarine and Amethyst once again, being a Dual Ray, a Ray of the Highest Frequency, meant just as Osiris and Isis were One, so too were we who undertook our duties which in reality was a work of great love and devotion, and was to us a great honour to be of service.

There were many of us from early childhood on, who regularly undertook visits to see the High Priests and Elders in the Temple of Osiris.

At that young age, both boys and girls went, but as the years went on, we were separated for reasons explained to us.

The boys would be High Priests and us girls, Priestesses of Osiris, which by their very nature, each role would be different.

However, to us Priestesses of Osiris, we were Blessed to meet at regular intervals with Isis, Beloved of Osiris.

Although Isis herself had her own Priesthood, and Beautiful and Divine was it to see, in reality as I have explained, what was taken into account in deciding whether to be a Priestess in the Order of Osiris or Isis, came down to the Ray and Origin of our Soul.

The ability to tune into the same High Vibration of Osiris on the Aquamarine Ray would prove a fundamental necessity in the many Tests of Initiation which were undertaken at the Temple of Osiris.

Although as mentioned the Aquamarine and Amethyst Rays are Dual in Origin, and can Merge and become One, or as was more often the case, Separate at Will, and Remain as a Ray in it’s own Right.

The Complete Attunement experienced on all levels from a soul born on the same Ray, would enable much Inner Mystery Work to be Undertaken and Accomplished.

It was a very joyous time.  We, the Priestesses of Osiris loved our work.  We undertook the Reading of Dreams.  We were considered a Sage – a Seer;  we saw into both the Past and the Future.  We learnt again of the Mysteries of Creation, which for many of us, had long been forgotten. 

We were taught about Life Eternal, the Flame of Eternal Light which was forever Lit, in the Temple of Osiris, gave to us Further Understanding and Inner Awareness of the Mysteries of Creation.

We spoke to Beings from Long Ago.  We loved to listen and look into The Records of Creation.  The Akashic Records were shown of How, Why and What For, The Meaning of Creation Itself.

Thus privileged with such Great Knowledge and Understanding, such was our Joy, as we not only undertook Steps of Purification and Initiation into the Higher Mysteries, but in so doing we became ever more in tune with God The Father-Mother-Son, and a Glimpse of Paradise itself was shown to us.

It was joyous for us Priestesses of Osiris to meet from time to time with Isis.  Sometimes both Osiris and Isis, shared moments with us which would forever live on, hidden too often, in lives to come.

But there will come a time, well into the future, when those Inner Teachings will begin to surface, gradually – step by step, in small insights at first, but with that constant wish for that hidden knowledge, more and more memories of Lost Teachings will Return.

I hope that is of help in answering your question?

Ariah, Priestess of Osiris, from Long Ago.

Pat Grabham

2 September, 2012.

Hi dear friends. If you haven't already, please take a look at the "Herbs, Plants, and Medical Topics group". There are some great posts for natural health, and wonderful herbs, and facts for you to read. Just click on this link to take you to the group, here on Shamballa. Blessings to all. Melodie

http://www.cityofshamballa.net/group/herbs-plants-spices-and-medical-topics

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Boost Low White Blood Cell Count and Immune Function Naturally
by Tony Isaacs

(The Best Years in Life)Low white blood cell counts are indicative of a suppressed immune system and can have many causes. Emotional state and stress, an unhealthy diet and lifestyle, and nutritional intake can all cause lower immune system response and low white blood cell counts. Low immunity can also be caused by a number of health conditions, by surgical or medical treatments and by the natural aging process. Whatever the cause, low immunity and low white blood cell counts prevent the body from being able to have an optimum response to infections and illness. Here are some things which can help prevent low immunity and keep white blood cell counts high:

• Avoid sugar and keep sweet stuff to a minimum. Sugar prevents white blood cells from being their strongest Eliminate unhealthy fats. Polyunsaturated fats in vegetable oils such as corn, safflower, and sunflower oil are deterrents to a healthy immune system.

• If you are overweight, lose a few pounds. Being overweight is very detrimental to your immune system and studies have shown that overweight people are less able to fight off infection.

• Drink plenty of water to boost the immune system as well as flush out toxins.
Exercise is a proven immune system booster. Exercise is best in moderation, however, since too much exercise may wear the body down and create immune system problems.

• Avoid stress and try to relax.Stress is rightly called the silent killer and too much stress invariably leads to a lowered immune system. Many food items help boost immune function and white blood cell counts.

For example:

• Carrots and other red, yellow, orange, and dark-green leafy vegetablescontain beta carotene which helps protect the immune system, especially the thymus gland. Beta carotene and other carotenes also strengthen white blood cell production, and foods rich in beta-carotene help the body better fight off infection.

• Yogurt can be very beneficial for the immune system.It helps the body produce antibodies and strengthens white blood cells. Note: Be sure to use only natural 100% organic yogurt, which you can flavor with fruits or raw organic honey. Most commercial yogurts may do more harm than good.

• A cup of kale will give you your daily requirement of vitamin A.This is an antioxidant that helps your body fight cancer cells and is essential in the formation of white blood cells. Vitamin A also increases the ability of antibodies to respond to invaders.

• People who eat more garlichave more natural killer white blood cells.

• Other helpful foods include chicken, kale, almonds, guava, crab, dark grapes and navy beans.Supplements can play a big role in boosting immune function and white blood cell counts. Some examples:

• Oleander extract in herbal supplement form. One herbal oleander based supplement was 100% effective in a clinical trial of raising white blood cell counts in HIV/AIDS patients with extremely compromised immune systems.

• Astragalus roothelps stimulate white blood cells and protects against invading organisms. It also enhances production of the important natural compound interferon to fight against viruses.

• Zincis necessary for white blood cell function and it acts as a catalyst in the immune system's killer response to foreign bodies.

• Vitamin Cis an immune enhancer that helps white blood cells perform at their peak and quickens the immune system response.

• The trace mineral seleniumis vital to the development and movement of white blood cells.

• Both Siberian ginseng (eleuthero) and Asian ginsengprovide support for the immune system.

• Echinacea helps stimulate the immune system in a variety of ways, including increased white blood cell production.

• Green Teaalso stimulates production of white blood cells.

• Some other potent immune boosters are pau d arco, suma, medicinal mushrooms, beta glucans and aloe vera.

Hi dear friends. If you haven't already, please take a look at the "Herbs, Plants, and Medical Topics group". There are some great posts for natural health, and wonderful herbs, and facts for you to read. Just click on this link to take you to the group, here on Shamballa. Blessings to all. Melodie

http://www.cityofshamballa.net/group/herbs-plants-spices-and-medical-topics

**********

Galphimia
What You Need to Know About Galphimia

By Cathy Wong, About.com Guide
Updated April 25, 2012

Galphimia glauca (sometimes referred to as "galphimia" or "thryallis") is an herb said to offer a number of health benefits. Extracted from a small evergreen shrub found in Mexico and Central America, galphimia is sometimes prepared as a homeopathic remedy.

Uses for Galphimia
In traditional Latin American medicine, galphimia has long been used to treat asthma and allergies. Galphimia is also generally used as a treatment for asthma and allergies when prepared as a homeopathic remedy.
In traditional Mexican medicine, meanwhile, galphimia has long been used to treat mental disorders. In particular, galphimia is thought to alleviate anxiety.

Benefits of Galphimia Extract
To date, research on the health effects of galphimia extract is very limited. Still, there's some evidence that galphimia extract may be of some use in the treatment of anxiety.
For instance, several animal-based studies have shown that galphimia extract may offer anti-anxiety benefits. In addition, a 2007 study published in Planta Medica indicates that galphimia extract may be useful in the treatment of anxiety disorders. For the study, 152 people with generalized anxiety disorder took either galphimia extract or lorazepam (a commonly used anxiety medication) every day for four weeks. Study results revealed that the anxiety-reducing effect of galphimia extract was similar to that of lorazepam.
Until larger, longer-term clinical trials are conducted, the safety and effectiveness of galphimia extract as an anxiety treatment cannot be determined.

Benefits of Homeopathic Galphimia
Scientific support for the health effects of homeopathic preparations of galphimia is also fairly limited. The available research includes an older meta-analysis published in the Austrian journal Wiener Medizinische Wochenschrift in 1997. For the meta-analysis, investigators reviewed 11 clinical trials (with a total of 1,038 patients) on the use of homeopathic preparations of galphimia in treatment of hay fever. Overall, homeopathic preparations of galphimia were found to be superior to placebo in relief of eye-related symptoms (such as itching and watering of the eyes).
There is a lack of more recent data on the potential health benefits of homeopathic galphimia.
Is Galphimia Safe?
Little is known about the safety of using galphimia in the long term. However, there's some concern that taking galphimia in combination with certain medications (such as central nervous system depressants and blood-thinning drugs) may produce harmful effects.
In addition, homeopathic preparations of galphimia may trigger a number of mild side effects, including fatigue and dry mouth.

Where to Find Galphimia
Available for purchase online, galphimia supplements and homeopathic preparations of galphimia are sold in many natural-food stores and in stores specializing in dietary supplements.

Should You Use Galphimia for Health Purposes?
Due to a lack of scientific support, it's too soon to recommend galphimia for treatment of any health condition. If you're considering the use of galphimia supplements or homeopathic preparations of galphimia, make sure to consult your physician. It's important to note that self-treating a chronic condition with galphimia and avoiding or delaying standard care may have serious consequences.
http://altmedicine.about.com/od/herbsupplementguide/a/Galphimia.htm?nl=1

Hi dear friends. If you haven't already, please take a look at the "Herbs, Plants, and Medical Topics group". There are some great posts for natural health, and wonderful herbs, and facts for you to read. Just click on this link to take you to the group, here on Shamballa. Blessings to all. Melodie

http://www.cityofshamballa.net/group/herbs-plants-spices-and-medical-topics

**************

Poléo: The Meandering Ways of Wild Mint
Posted: 27 Jun 2012 06:10 PM PDT

This post is for the Wild Mint month of the Wild Things Roundup hosted by Wendy Petty’s Hunger & Thirst blog

Herbs of the Canyon: Poléo and the Grasshopper Mouse © Kiva Rose

Poléo: The Meandering Ways of Wild Mint
by Kiva Ringtail Rose

Botanical Name: Mentha arvensis (often considered synonymous with M. canadensis)
Common Names: Wild Mint, Corn Mint, Brook Mint, Horse Mint, Corn Mint
Energetic Tendencies: Variable temperature, dry
Taste/Impression: Aromatic, acrid
Actions:diaphoretic, stimulant nervine, aromatic digestive (including carminative), emmenagogue, spasmolytic, choleretic (via regulating liver qi.)
Tucked in among the opalescent hedges of Bluestem Willows and silver-skinned Canyon Alders that line the San Francisco River’s lush banks, a wreath of lavender spikes adorn the square stems of the River Mint. In the thick underbrush of our bosque, it can be easy to overlook this sprawling wildflower until you sit or step on it, and the sharp yet sweet minty aroma fills the air. The distinctive fragrance, square stems, and punk-rock spiked flower-do make it easy to recognize, and its wild abundance makes it a great plant for all herbalists and foragers to know about.
Here in the arid southwestern New Mexico, I only see Wild Mint growing where it can keep its feet wet, usually along rivers and creeks, or near seeps in moist meadows or riparian canyons. However, I’d imagine that in wetter environments, this would also be a common herb of fields, roadsides, and perhaps even the back yard or hedgerow. Like many of our most well-known herbs for food and healing, mints of various species are ubiquitous throughout much of the temperate world. Appreciated for food, beverage, medicine, chasing pesky insects away, fragrance, and more, there’s a wide range of traditions and sources to draw upon for inspiration and information.
Most folks just call this plant Wild Mint or Brook Mint, but in the Spanish-infused culture of my home, it’s just as likely to be referred to as Poléo, a name I’ll be using frequently in this exploration of Mentha arvensis. Additionally, I’d like to note that in this article (as usual) I’m speaking only of my personal experience with the plant, and only of preparations I’ve made myself, and so this doesn’t include uses of the essential oil.
The overall pattern of Mint’s action has to do with initiating movement, usually through mixed stimulant and relaxant actions, which is to be expected from its both aromatic and acrid taste and impression. I find it fitting that many Mentha species tend to grow alongside moving water, as the Mints themselves are very much about allowing and redirecting flow. This can be seen in the way it relaxes tense, cramping muscles, how it can free the flow of belated menses, moves stagnant energy, increases peripheral circulation, and even helps regulate the movement of stuck liver function. This moving, meandering tendency of Mint can even be felt in the mouth, in its tongue-tingling impression that brings a feeling refreshment and awakeness.

The Tongue Tingling Goodness of River Mint:Food Uses

There’s no shortage of widely available recipes involving all manner of Mentha species, so I’ll just touch on a few ideas here. One of my favorite ways to eat our River Mint is in the form of various pestos. Some people find the flavor too strong on its own, but it blends very well with the sharp spice of Oregano de la Sierra (Monarda fistulosa var. menthifolia) or the green freshness of Sweet Clover (Melilotus spp.), or the mild but mineral-laden vibrance of Nettles (Urtica spp.)
Infused in vinegar, Poléo makes a great addition to many salad dressings, or diluted with cold water it can be a refreshing drink during the hottest days of a long Summer, especially with a bit of Mint-infused honey or molasses. There are many times for specific recipes of this type, from switchel to oxymel to many more exotic terms, they’re all yummy and come with their own fascinating bits of history and culture.
I very much enjoy Moroccan style tea made with high quality gunpowder green tea, Wild Mint, Lemon Verbena, and sometimes a pinch of Mugwort or Wormwood. Wild Mint is also very lovely in all manner of aperitif type drinks, and can be made into a syrup for adding a variety of mixed drinks for pleasure. It infuses into wine well, whether homemade or storebought.

Diaphoresis, the Immune System, and Gypsy Tea

One of the most useful overall actions in an herb is the ability to increase peripheral circulation, and thus trigger diaphoreses when required. Diaphoretics are most thought of in cold/flu, usually when there’s a fever present, and most especially when the fever has become unproductive. Diaphoretic teas have been used for as long as most can recall for “breaking a fever” by increasing the peripheral circulation, usually until a visible sweat appears on the person, which is often followed by a timely recovery. Because of this, people tend to think of diaphoretics as simply causing sweating, but this is a vast oversimplification of a much more vital function of the immune system.
The single most classic diaphoretic tea is mostly likely the herbal triplet of Elderflower, Mint, and Yarrow, often called Gypsy Tea (a name which may either flatter or piss off your local Roma population). Your standard Peppermint can work quite nicely there, or try an especially spicy species of Monarda if you need an extra stimulating and warming formula, but Mentha arvensis is the plant I use most often for the Mint part of the recipe. It’s strong tasting, but won’t burn the tongue like a Monarda can, and kicks up the peripheral circulation with little fuss. Plus, it grows right down by the river pretty much year round and I can even my 11 year old daughter down to fetch some up to the cabin, as it’s both easily recognized and locally abundant.
A strong mint like this is both stimulating and relaxing to some degree, but much more toward the stimulating end of the spectrum overall. It excels at moving stagnation throughout the body, including the circulation, which is exactly why it’s so incredibly useful in diaphoretic teas at the onset of a cold or flu, or when that same cold/flu has decided to try and stick around rather than moving along at a polite pace.
The idea of stimulating versus relaxing diaphoretics can seem confusing or intimidating at first glance, but really it’s quite common sense. Indications for relaxant diaphoretics include signs of excess tension such as restlessness, irritability, a rapid pulse, a flushed face and red tongue, insomnia, tight muscles, and jerky, rapid movements. Indications for stimulating diaphoretics include signs of excess laxity such as lethargy, weakness, pallor, slow pulse, pale tongue, apathy, subjective feelings of coldness, and an aversion to wind and cold.
If truly in doubt it usually works pretty well to give a formula that’s a mix of relaxant and stimulating diaphoretics such as the basic Elderflower/Mint/Yarrow one given above. Mints can work in almost any case, with Spearmint more appropriate for small children or those of delicate constitution, with Peppermint and River Mint being more called for in the average adult or an especially robust little one. Note that for diaphoretic teas to be effective they need to be taken very warm to hot in temperature, preferably while the person is bundled up.

Moving the Digestive Currents

Just as River Mint has a way with moving sluggish circulation, it is likewise quite adept at helping stagnant belly energy on its way. This is particularly useful where there’s bloating, epigastric pressure, constipation, and/or the desire to burp but the inability to do so, with the excess air staying firmly stuck somewhere in the vicinity of the chest cavity. As with most gut/digestive issues, tea is often preferable for this sort of thing, but tincture, elixir, syrup, infused vinegar, or similar can also work if that’s what you have on hand.
Keep in mind that Mentha species can aggravate some cases of acid reflux, and is generally most appropriate where energy needs to be moved up, whereas something like acid reflux is a clear sign of energy that needs to be rooted and pushed down. If Mint doesn’t work, there’s stuck belly energy, but you can’t figure out what direction it needs to go in, try an Artemisia instead.
Mint can also be one of our most effective herbs for nausea, especially lingering nausea after food poisoning or stomach flu. Again, it’s generally most helpful as a tea for this application, although I have seen the tincture/elixir have a notable effect when the tea is not available. Mint is doubly useful post flu or food poisoning because of how useful its anti-spasmodic action can be on residual gut cramping. I’ve certainly seen Mint’s belly settling powers in clients, but got an extra personal bit of experience with this particular action when I caught the flu about a month before last year’s Traditions in Western Herbalism Conference, and I couldn’t seem to shake the nausea, dizziness, and weakness long after the actual virus had moved on. Strong Mint tea set all that to rest for several hours though, and I could be seen wandering around firmly attached to my thermos of Peppermint and Wild Mint tea throughout the event.
Alongside Mint’s related digestive effects, it can be very useful in cases where there’s stagnant depression that is accompanied by bloating, and sometimes by lack of appetite overall. Traditional healers have long known that our emotions and state of mind are intimately tied to gut health, while conventional medicine is just beginning to catch up with this notion that was only recently considered radical by the mainstream.
As a side note, I have not seen Mentha species be as useful in motion sickness, where I’m more likely to suggest Peach leaf or Ginger. It does work sometimes, but not as consistently as the other aforementioned herbs.

Releasing the Flow: Poléo as Emmenagogue

A distinctive trait among the Mentha genus specific to Poléo is its high pulegone content, also found in Pennyroyal, that causes this species to be a very effective emmenagogue. It’s most indicated where the menses are late, there’s a feeling of heaviness and bloating, and a distinct feeling of stuckness in the pelvic area, sometimes (but not always) accompanied by dull, intermittent cramping. It teams up well with Ginger where there’s feelings of coldness along with the other symptoms, and Motherwort where there’s more likely to be overheatedness, a flushed face, and a quick temper.
This particular action makes the plant inadvisable during pregnancy, especially the early stages of a delicate pregnancy. However, the chances of successfully using this plant to purposely terminate even a very early stage of pregnancy are basically nil, so it’s probably not worthwhile making yourself ill feeling with massive doses trying (same applies to the whole plant of Pennyroyal).

Meanders & Other Thoughts

Something not generally discussed in contemporary Western Herbalism in regards to Mentha spp. is their specific effect on the hepatic system. Particularly with Peppermint and Poléo, this genus has particular affinity for clearing unresolving rashes that are triggered by liver wind and heat, as in many cases of acute hepatitis or flareups in chronic hepatitis. Tea or tincture can work in this situation.
Additionally, Wild Mint (and other allied species), can be great for helping to relieve pain and inflammation of sore throats from acute cold/flu onset, especially if accompanied by a fever. I like to make simple honey pastilles using finely ground herbs in approximately equal proportions of Rose petals, Wild Mint leaves, Marshmallow root, and Sage leaf.

Preparations:

Wild Mint is amenable to a great many preparations, but it’s important to keep in mind that the aromatics are a large portion of what you’re after, so you don’t want to lose them through too much heat processing or evaporation. A simple but strong tea is often the best way for most folks. Most find it tasty that way, and even more so if blended with other Mentha species, a bit of Lemon Balm, and/or some honey.
I do often make an elixir with brandy or rum and local desert wildflower honey to have something more easily transportable on hand… but really, a thermos or travel cup is pretty convenient as well, and many of Mint’s most important actions just work better when its taken hot, even if that means a couple squirts of tincture taken in a cup of hot water.
Also, I do make some of my standard bitters blends with various mints included for its carminative and overall digestive stimulating effects. Below you’ll find a simple recipe for just such a general bitters formula.

Wild River Bitters Blend

• 1 part Dandelion leaf/root (preferably Spring harvested)

• 1 part Mugwort (or whate ver local Artemisia spp. you have on hand, more used if its a less bitter species like A. vulgaris and less for super bitter species.)

• 1 part Wild Mint flowering tops

These can be tinctured either fresh or dried in your preferred alcohol, and a portion of something like raw honey, molasses or maple syrup can be added for specific medicinal reasons, or simply to satisfy your taste buds. A dropperful (or a teaspoonful, if you prefer) 15 minutes before eating can help stimulate digestion after a heavy meal, or if you tend to experience bloating after eating. I do suggest fine tuning bitters blends for the individual, but this is a nice general formula to keep on hand.

Dosage:

Wild Mint is generally a safe, food-like herb, and the tea, pesto, and similar preparations can all be taken to taste and satisfaction, except for in pregnant women (in which case just substitute a milder mint like Spearmint in food-like preparations), without much cause for concern. In a medicinal sense, if Poléo is going to work for nausea, it’ll probably cause the symptoms to abate within the first half cup or so of tea. If it doesn’t help then, it’s worth trying something else.

Considerations:

Not advisable during pregnancy due to emmenagogue action. Can aggravate some cases of acid reflux. Generally a safe, pleasant, and well tolerated herb by a wide variety of folks but not constitutionally appropriate in large doses or over long periods of time for those debilitated from chronic illness, especially if profuse sweating exists as a symptom.

References and Resources:

McDonald, Jim – Correspondence, handouts, classes, writings, and other bits of brilliance.
Moore, Michael - Medicinal Plants of the Mountain West, 2nd Edition
Ross, Jeremy – Combining Western Herbs and Chinese Medicine: A Clinical Materia Medica
http://bearmedicineherbals.com/wildmint.html?

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Hi dear friends. If you haven't already, please take a look at the "Herbs, Plants, and Medical Topics group". There are some great posts for natural health, and wonderful herbs, and facts for you to read. Just click on this link to take you to the group, here on Shamballa. Blessings to all. Melodie

http://www.cityofshamballa.net/group/herbs-plants-spices-and-medical-topics

**********

Today's Daily Health Tip
Berries May Provide Parkinson's Disease Protection

On your next trip to the supermarket, you might want to consider stocking up on the strawberries and blueberries. Not only are they a tasty treat, but according to new research, they just might help in the prevention of Parkinson's disease.

The study, which took place at Harvard Medical School in Boston, found that adults who ate two or more servings of strawberries or blueberries a week lowered their risk of Parkinson's disease by close to 25 percent compared with individuals who consumed berries less than once a month. More than 130,000 men and women participated in the research. Over a 20-year follow-up period, their health records were analyzed and just over 800 of the subjects eventually developed Parkinson's disease.

But the berry eaters were much less likely to end up with a diagnosis of Parkinson's. It seems that the most probable reason for their benefit is the flavonoids that are so prevalent in strawberries and blueberries. These antioxidants, found mainly in various fruits and vegetables, work hard to eradicate harmful substances from all over the body, including the brain.

Parkinson's disease is a condition affecting the brain that is caused by the gradual destruction of dopamine-generating cells in that organ. Dopamine is a chemical produced within the brain that stimulates our reward and pleasure centers, giving us a sensation of feeling good. As the disease progresses, patients have increasing tremors and problems controlling their muscles. (Incidentally, if you progress to that state, you might want to consider a formula based on L-carnosine, Acetyl-l-carnitine, and DMAE, as it may help with tremors.)

The researchers are not sure exactly why flavonoids can help in the prevention of Parkinson's disease, but they offer a plethora of benefits at any rate. And, if you are not a fan of blueberries or strawberries, they can be found in other foods as well. In fact, study participants who ate flavonoids from a variety of sources such as apples, tea, and red wine in addition to the berries were even less likely to be diagnosed with Parkinson's disease. The men, in particular, who consumed the most flavonoids had a 40 percent lower risk of developing Parkinson's during the analysis period than their peers who ate the least flavonoids.

Out of all the sources of flavonoids, blueberries in particular seem to offer us the most all-around benefits. A 2008 study performed at the University of Reading and the Peninsula Medical School in England discovered that blueberries may be able to reverse cognitive impairment. The scientists fed elderly rats a regular diet supplemented with about five ounces of blueberries a day for 12 weeks.

After three weeks the rats showed considerable improvement in performing tasks involving spatial memory. In fact, the blueberry-enhanced old rats performed as well as young rats, improving memory by 83 percent, and the improvements continued for the remaining nine weeks of the study.

And a 2009 study at Ohio State University found that blueberries may shrink blood vessel tumors in babies while doubling survival rates. The research team fed blueberry extract to mice that had tumors. The mice receiving the extract lived twice as long as those mice that had blood vessel tumors but didn't take the extract. Also the tumors in the blueberry mice were 60 percent smaller than those in the control group.

Other research has documented the blueberry's ability to inhibit the growth of cancer cells, prevent bladder infections, lower cholesterol, reduce nasal congestion, and protect against degenerative eye diseases. Imagine how much healthier the world could be if we were all regular blueberry eaters.

From our brains on down, blueberries can benefit our bodies, and when we add other sources of flavonoids, we just boost their collective power.

Turn to Mother Nature for some healthy, tasty preventative medicine. And if you've already got an illness, rather than trying to alleviate the symptoms with pharmaceuticals prescribed by your doctor, give berries a try. Eaten regularly, they just might prove to be the right medicine for what ails you, without all the side effects of the drugstore stuff.

To read more about how blueberries can actually reverse mental decline, click here.

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The healthy superfoods you should be eating
By Rachael Anne Hill | The Slim Down – Thu, Jun 28, 2012

Yahoo! nutritionist Rachael Anne Hill identifies four nutrient-packed, super-healthy foods we should be eating but are often forgotten about.

Quinoa

Although commonly referred to as a grain, quinoa (pronounced keen-wah) is actually a seed. Available from most good health stores and supermarkets, it can be cooked and eaten in much the same way as rice and contains all the essential amino acids (the amino acids your body can't make) so it is an excellent source of complete protein for vegans and vegetarians.

Quinoa is low in fat but rich in cholesterol-lowering fibre and is a good source of B vitamins needed for repair of body cells and an efficient metabolism. Quinoa contains energy-giving iron too (the mineral women are most likely to be deficient in), calcium for strong bones and potassium, which can help to reduce high blood pressure. It's also a good source of magnesium, which can reduce the frequency of headaches by helping to relax the blood vessels that supply the brain. In short, quinoa is a super-healthy super food and introducing it to your diet is a smart and tasty choice.

Cold pressed rapeseed oil

Cold pressed rapeseed oil (cold pressed means the oil is naturally extracted from the plant at room temperature without the addition of any chemicals) has balanced levels of omega 3, 6 and 9. Together these make up the essential fatty acids vital for lowering cholesterol, reducing inflammation that can cause heart disease and premature ageing, boosting the immune system and nourishing skin, hair, bones and joints. It also has half the saturated fat and ten times the omega 3 content of olive oil and is an excellent source of skin-enhancing vitamin E.

Cook with it, drizzle sparingly over salads, rice or pasta dishes or mix with balsamic vinegar, garlic and a little honey for a really delicious salad dressing.

Crab

Crab is a slimmer's dream because it's low in calories (a four ounce serving of crab meat has only 98 calories), full of flavour and with under two grams of fat per serving, it's heart-healthy too.

Despite its low calorie content, it is a great source of protein so it's a really filling and satisfying food. Crab is also a good source of omega 3s which help to lower triglycerides and blood pressure along with reducing the risk of heart disease.
Omega 3s are also thought to reduce inflammation, enhance immune function and even lower the risk of certain types of cancer. Try topping a salad with flakes of fresh crab meat or alternatively add tinned crab meat to fish cakes or fish pies.

Radishes

These hot tasting little vegetables are members of the cruciferous family and owe their pungent flavour to super nutrients called glucosinolates that are also found in broccoli and cabbage.

Glucosinolates help to boost detoxing enzymes in the liver, have anti-cancer properties and aid digestion. Radishes contain just one calorie each and come packaged up with plenty of hunger-combating fibre so they are great for the waistline.

Chomping your way through just ten radishes will provide you with 25% of your daily vitamin C and their leaves, which are also edible, contain six times more. Add them to summer salads for an extra peppery kick or dip them into hummus and tzatziki.

The Insomnia-No-More: A curry that makes you fall asleep

A TV chef has created a curry that leaves you drowsy 20 minutes after eating it

The curry that helps tackle insomnia © SWNSCelebrity Indian chef and TV presenter Gurpareet Bains has made a curry that produces similar effects to sleeping pills.
People have reported feeling "tired and spaced out" within 20 minutes of eating it and a journalist said he was "almost comatose" after a taste test.
Gurpareet says he created the curry to try and help people sleep.

“This dish was designed with one thing in mind - to help people with insomnia.
"Its ingredients have been used for millennia for their tranquilising properties, and our research has shown it to work incredibly well,” he told reporters.

Gurpareet Bains - creator of the insomnia-fighting curry © SWNSThe key insomnia-fighting ingredient in the curry is nutmeg, which contains myristicin - an oil that produces 'intoxicating' effects if people eat a lot of it at once.The chef includes a whole ground tablespoon of it in his recipe! No wonder people fall asleep…

Only minutes after a TV producer tried "a few mouthfuls" of the curry for a live taste test, she said: "My eyes feel quite heavy. I think if I was at home right now lying down I would fall asleep."

The recipe features in Gurpareet’s book, Indian Superspices. It’s the follow-up to his debut, Indian Superfoods – an Amazon bestseller.

In the past, he’s created a cancer-fighting curry, a hangover curing curry and a curry that can prevent you from catching a cold.

We might need to try out some of his recipes!

Beneficial Bacteria | Probiotic Research Newsletter
Date: 07/09/2012 Written by: Jon Barron © 1999-2012 The Baseline of Health Foundation

The Co-option of Probiotics Has Begun

Beneficial bacteria are in the news with new probiotic research now promoting their benefits. It appears the medical community has decided to "step in" and take over this core natural medicine concept and make it their own. And not surprisingly, not one article about these new studies makes mention of the fact that 90% of their conclusions about the benefits of probiotics has been known and incorporated into natural healing programs for many years. Probiotics are now being co-opted.

One of my pet peeves is how the mainstream medical community -- and thus the media -- trashes a particular alternative health concept for years until it finally "discovers" that same concept and claims it as their own. The examples are endless, but several certainly stand out.

• Diverticular disease
• Fiber
• Cigarette smoking as deadly
• Trans fatty acids
• High sugar intake
• Etc.
• Etc.
• Etc.

In each case, the concept, when promoted by the natural health community, was mocked and dismissed. As I've discussed before, diverticular disease (or bowel pockets as it was called by natural healers back in the day) was dismissed by mainstream medicine for over half a century before the medical community adopted it as their own -- with no mention at all, ever, that holistic healers had nailed it long ago and had been saving people's lives for many years by preventing and eliminating it. In fact, the standard line from the medical community during that half century of denial was, "We've been opening people up for years in surgeries and autopsies, and we've never seen any sign of this mythical disease." But it's hardly mythical anymore.

We now know that diverticular disease will afflict virtually everyone eating a first world diet…if they live long enough. As for cigarette smoking, while the alternative healers were screaming about its dangers for decades, the medical community was promoting its virtues for weight-loss and running "physician tested and approved" ads for cigarette companies in the Journal of the American Medical Association.1 And then there's trans fatty acids. Even as those of us in the alternative health community were identifying artificial trans fats as one of the single biggest contributors to heart disease and premature death, the medical community was promoting their virtues and advising their patients to switch from butter to high trans fat margarine -- for health reasons. Now of course, they are at the forefront of the "ban trans fatty acids" movement -- and once again, without any acknowledgement of the role the alternative health community played in bringing this issue to the fore.

But other than bruised ego, why is this such a big deal?

The problem is that the medical community gets to have their cake and eat it too -- and the rest of us pick up the health tab. For all the years the medical community derides a concept -- detoxing would be a current example -- they get to score clever media points with their mocking articles and poorly conceived studies. Unfortunately, millions of people are dissuaded from incorporating these life saving concepts into their lives. How many deaths was JAMA responsible for when they ran ads promoting cigarettes?

And then, years later when they co-opted the issue by adopting it as their own, without giving even a tip of the hat to natural healers who pioneered the trail, they "take it away" from the alternative community, and deny its validity to the people who discovered it. (As the old saying goes, "You can always tell the pioneers. They're the ones with the arrows in their backs.") This allows mainstream medicine to continually dismiss complementary medicine as placebo based, or unscientific. After all, it didn't work when they were mocking it. And it has nothing to do with alternative health when they take it over. It's a rigged game.

That said; let's take a look at the flurry of new probiotic studies that signal the first step in the co-option of beneficial bacteria.

Probiotics Are More Necessary than We Ever Thought

Within the human body, it is estimated that there are 10 times as many microbial cells as human cells, and the vast majority of them are actually beneficial and "support" our biological functions. These symbiotic microbial partners perform a number of metabolic reactions that are not encoded in (and therefore not handled by) the human genome but are nevertheless necessary for human health. Therefore, when we talk about the "human genome," if we want to truly understand what's happening, we should think of it as an amalgam of all our human genes and the trillions of microbes that share our bodies with us. For this reason, the National Institutes of Health Human Microbiome Project (HMP) has been performing metagenomic sequencing of microbe samples from a healthy human population to address questions such as whether there is a "core" microbiome at individual body sites and whether variation in the microbiome can be systematically studied.2 In June, they released some of their results. (Note: microbiome refers to the totality of all the microbes that live in and on us.)

Among observations that are old hat to the alternative health community, but "new" to the medical community are "revelations" such as:

• Healthy people share their bodies with more than 10,000 species of microbes -- living on our skin, in the mucous membrane of our noses and mouths, and most notably, throughout the length and breadth of our intestinal tracts. However, these trillions of microbial cells are so small that taken all together they make up only about 1 to 3 percent of our body mass.

• No one has all 10,000 species. Your specific mix depends on where you live, what you eat, and your exposure to antibiotics -- either therapeutically or in your food. However, only a few are unique in function, and they are present in all healthy people. The rest vary from person to person, but are redundant in benefits so that their presence is not necessarily required. Or to put it another way, a wide variety can do the same jobs.

• All told, their collective weight is upwards of six pounds in a person of 200 lbs.

• And they play a key role in keeping you healthy…and even alive.

Intestinal Microflora, Gut-Metabolic Cross talk and Human Microbiome Project Update

http://youtu.be/ky5cBM9j7NE

Developments surrounding our understanding of the intestine and it's associated microflora are contending to be the most exciting research topics of the 21st Century. This quick update reviews research pertaining toInteractions between the gut Microbiota and the intestinal mmune system as well as metabolic-intestinal cross talk.

A "big surprise" to the researchers was that harmful bacteria are present in and on almost everyone. Why it's a surprise, I don't know. The Centers for Disease Control has stated for several years now that 25 to 30 percent of humans are carriers for Staphylococcus aureus (the flesh eating bacteria), which has no impact on their health but can nevertheless infect others. In healthy people, harmful bacteria such as S. aureas are kept in check (unable to proliferate wildly).

As I just mentioned, the researchers seemed puzzled by this and wondered why the bad bacteria harmed some people and not others. What causes some people's bacterial population to turn unhealthy? But this is old news to people familiar with a holistic understanding of the human body.

I've explained for years that unhealthy bacteria (not to mention viruses and other pathogens such as Candida) are always present but kept in check both by the body's immune system and, more importantly, by "friendly" bacteria. In other words, in healthy people, there is bacterial balance. In unhealthy people there is not. Again, this is no surprise to those in the holistic community. In fact, we even have a name for a state of microbial imbalance. It's called dysbiosis.

"This is a whole new way of looking at human biology and human disease, and it's awe-inspiring," says Dr. Phillip Tarr of Washington University at St. Louis, one of the lead researchers.3 "These bacteria are not passengers. They are metabolically active. As a community, we now have to reckon with them like we have to reckon with the ecosystem in a forest or a body of water." And like environmental ecosystems, your microbial makeup varies widely by body part. Your skin could be like a rainforest, your intestines teeming with different species like an ocean.

In addition to all of the above, the microbiome project has discovered that all of these microbes provide a less obvious, but potentially far, far more important benefit than any we have yet discussed. In the human body, there are upwards of 30,000 genes. But the microbes in our microbiome add to that total exponentially -- about 8 million genes in total. And these genes replicating in the beneficial bacterial produce substances that perform critical functions in the health and development of their human hosts. For example, genes from gut bacteria aid in the digestion of certain proteins and fats. They also produce inflammation-fighting chemicals, and immune factors such as acidolin, acidophilin, and lactocidin, not to mention a number of B vitamins.

And even more amazing, the microbial populations of the microbiome are in constant "intelligent" flux to accommodate changing circumstances. For example, according to researchers in a report that appeared just last month in PLoS One, during pregnancy, the vaginal microbiome becomes less diverse and less abundant, with one particular type of bacteria dominating.4

"We anticipated that the vaginal microbiome would alter throughout pregnancy, but did not anticipate as significant and profound a difference between pregnant and non-pregnant women," said Dr. Kjersti Aagaard, one of the study's authors. Why does it change? Perhaps it's to give the fetus as healthy a passage as possible. Previous probiotic research has found differences in which first bacteria babies absorb, depending on whether they're born vaginally or by C-section, a possible explanation for why cesareans raise the risk for certain infections.

The bottom line is that our microbiome is far more diverse and far more important than scientists previously thought. Perhaps this will give doctors yet another reason to not prescribe antibiotics so indiscriminately. Given what we have just learned about the microbiome, antibiotics are far more damaging to your overall health than doctors previously imagined. Yes, they may kill offending bacteria, but they also kill an entire support network of trillions of life forms that coexist in and on your body, which are in fact part of it and essential to your health. Any doctor that prescribes a round of antibiotics for you and then at the very least doesn't subsequently prescribe supplemental probiotics to jump start the rebuilding process is woefully ignorant.

Without that jump start, you are begging for bacteria to rebuild asymmetrically, creating a state of dysbiosis that can result in years of compromised health. Also, for similar reasons -- not to mention the fact that like antibiotics, they promote the growth of super bacteria -- antibacterial soaps are not recommended. But you already knew that.

Even Beneficial Bacteria Can Be Harmful When in the Wrong Place

A study published in the April edition of PLoS ONE has found that the bacteria in our guts regulate the immune system as well as related autoimmune diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis.5 Specifically, they found that larger-than-normal populations of specific gut bacteria (usually considered beneficial) may actually trigger the development of diseases like rheumatoid arthritis in certain situations and possibly fuel disease progression in people genetically predisposed to this condition.

"A lot of people suspected that gut flora played a role in rheumatoid arthritis, but no one had been able to prove it because they couldn't say which came first -- the bacteria or the genes," said senior author Veena Taneja, Ph.D., a Mayo Clinic immunologist. "Using genomic sequencing technologies, we have been able to show the gut microbiome may be used as a biomarker for predisposition."

Other diseases with suspected gut bacterial ties include type I diabetes and multiple sclerosis.

"The gut is the largest immune organ in the body," said co-author Bryan White, Ph.D., director of the University of Illinois' Microbiome Program in the Division of Biomedical Sciences and a member of the Institute for Genomic Biology. "Because it's presented with multiple insults daily through the introduction of new bacteria, food sources, and foreign antigens, the gut is continually teasing out what's good and bad."

The gut has several ways to do this, including the mucosal barrier that prevents organisms -- even commensal or "good" bacteria -- from crossing the lumen of the gut into the human body. However, when "good" bacteria breach this barrier, they can trigger autoimmune responses. Dr. White goes on to say that the body recognizes them as out of place, and in some way this triggers the body to attack itself.

"The next step for us is to show if bugs in the gut can be manipulated to change the course of disease," Dr. Taneja says.

As a side note (my observation, not the researchers), this study points a very interesting accusatory finger at aspirin in terms of rheumatoid arthritis. Yes, as a Cox-2 inhibitor, aspirin can be effective in reducing the pain and inflammation associated with rheumatoid arthritis; but as a Cox-1 inhibitor, it simultaneously compromises the mucosal lining of the intestinal tract (the reason it causes intestinal bleeding), and thus may facilitate the passage of the "beneficial" bacterial through the gut and into the body -- thus triggering an autoimmune response and the resultant rheumatoid arthritis.

An interesting epidemiological study awaits some researcher there, I should think.

Dairy Fats Contribute to Bacterial Changes that Lead to Inflammatory Bowel Diseases
Meanwhile, new probiotic research published on June 13th in the journal Nature has linked dairy fats and bacteria in the gut with the onset of inflammatory diseases.6 The researchers found that diets high in certain dairy fats changed the way food was digested and encouraged the growth of harmful bacteria. They used genetically modified mice which were more likely to develop inflammatory bowel diseases. One in three developed colitis when fed either low-fat diets or meals high in polyunsaturated fats. This doubled to nearly two in three in those fed a diet high in saturated milk fats, which are used in many processed foods.

These saturated milk fats are hard for the body to digest, and it responds by pumping more bile into the gut. This changes the gut environment and leads to a change in the bacteria growing there, the researchers said. One bacterium in particular, Bilophila wadsworthia, was identified. It thrives in the extra bile produced to break down the fats.

It went from being incredibly rare to nearly 6% of all bacteria in the gut in the high-dairy-fat diet.

Commenting on this probiotic research, Dr Roy Sleator, from the Cork Institute of Technology, said: "Not only do the authors provide, what is in my opinion, the first credible explanation as to how Western diet contributes to the unusually high incidence in inflammatory bowel disease; they also suggest an effective means of dealing with such diseases, by simply reshaping the microbial balance of the gut." (Not consuming dairy fats in processed foods is another way to go, of course.)

We already know that a number of the proteins in dairy are highly allergenic. And now we learn that even the fats are problematic. I know there are some in the alternative health community who are strongly pro dairy. I am not. However, as I've repeatedly said, if you are going to consume dairy, you want it raw, organic, and grass fed.

Mutant Acidophilus May Reverse Colon Cancer

And once again in a study released last month -- in this case in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences -- a team of researchers from the University of Florida published their findings concerning the development of a genetically-modified form of the acidophilus that greatly reduced abnormal gut inflammation and reversed colon cancer in mice. This special variant of the acidophilus bacteria halted abnormal inflammation, reduced precancerous growths, and reversed the progression of severe cancerous lesions in the large intestines of mice.7

In earlier studies, the probiotic research team had demonstrated that a genetically modified form of acidophilus can bring overactive immune responses back to normal.

They have now found that proteins on the surface of the specially modified bacteria can act on the immune system to either cause inflammation in the gut or tune it down.

In other words, it works as an immunomodulator. In their current study, the researchers removed an inflammation-causing gene from the bacterium, and the result was a new form of the beneficial bacteria that was even better at controlling disease-causing inflammation. Moreover, mice with severe cases of polyps and cancerous intestinal lesions that were fed the modified bacteria had a significantly reduced number of colon polyps compared with untreated mice, and showed no signs of active colon cancer or disease-causing inflammation.

According to principal investigator Mansour Mohamadzadeh, "We have demonstrated that our bacterial treatment can take on established colon cancer. "This is huge, because people don't come to you 10 years before they have colon cancer saying, ‘I may get colon cancer; can you treat me?' They come to you and say, ‘I have colon cancer.'"

The modified bacteria are easy and cost-effective to produce. As a treatment for humans, it is likely to be in the form of a pill like most probiotic supplements used today. Patients could receive the beneficial bacterial treatment in combination with surgery or other therapies.

For years, researchers have understood that uncontrolled inflammation in the large intestine can result in various diseases, including colon cancer and inflammatory bowel diseases such as ulcerative colitis. This new study focused on understanding how to curb immune system processes in the gut that lead to harmful inflammation. Resulting treatments could work not just for diseases of the digestive tract but also for other conditions such as diabetes and Sjögrens syndrome in which inflammation plays a major role. It also suggests that some of the hundreds of strains of probiotics currently found in the human gut (and available in supplemental form) might produce many of the same results already -- if they were present in sufficient quantities. For example, probiotic research in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition has for some time indicated that probiotics can relieve intestinal inflammation and that probiotic bacteria have anti-inflammatory qualities.8 Why wait for a magic pill? Strains known to be helpful in this regard include:

• Bifidobacteria
• L. acidophilus
• L. salivarius9
• L. rhamnosus10
• L. plantarum11
• S. thermophilus12

Conclusion

The microbes in our microbiome are not just helpful; they are essential. They allow us to digest food, to assimilate the nutrients in that food, and they play a huge role -- just beginning to be understood -- in our immune functioning and in many other processes in our bodies. And they protect our mucosal linings and skin from deadly pathogens such as flesh eating bacteria. Quite simply, we cannot live without a healthy microbiome. And yet, we are constantly attacking and destroying it.

• We bathe in and drink chlorinated water. Chlorine is antibacterial; it kills all of the bacteria -- good and bad -- in your microbiome.

• We use antibacterial soaps, which kill all of the beneficial bacteria on your skin along with the bad, thus leaving you defenseless against flesh eating bacteria.

• We eat meat and dairy products laced with antibiotics, which destroy our intestinal flora.

• Our doctors prescribe antibiotics for us like candy, which creates a state of dysbiosis in our intestinal tracts and breeds super bacteria that can attack us later.

• And we no longer eat fermented foods to replenish the damaged populations.

Why would we expect good health when we work so hard to destroy it? Over the next few years, armed with its new understanding, doctors and the media are now likely to begin rethinking this assault on health and start working with nature rather than against it. Unfortunately, they are also likely to shove the alternative health community aside on this issue and displace natural probiotic supplements with custom engineered, prescription based versions.

Here's hoping that, just maybe, the medical community might show a little class this time and offer an acknowledgement to all those in the alternative health community who pointed the way…but I wouldn't hold my breath.

• 1. HemOnc Today. "Cigarettes were once ‘physician' tested, approved." Healio. March 10, 2009 (Accessed 22 June 2012.) <http://www.healio.com/hematology-oncology/news/print/hematology-oncology/%7B241D62A7-FE6E-4C5B-9FED-A33CC6E4BD7C%7D/Cigarettes-were-once-physician-tested-approved>;

• 2. The Human Microbiome Project Consortium. "A framework for human microbiome research." Nature 486,215--221(14 June 2012) <http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v486/n7402/full/nature11209.html>;

• 3. Lauran Neergaard. "10,000 germ species live in and on healthy people. Associated Press. Jun 14. (Accessed 22 June 2012.) <http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_MED_BODY_OF_GERMS?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2012-06-13-16-47-23>;

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Natural Anti-Aging & Chronic Joint Pain | Health Newsletter

Date: 05/07/2007 Written by: Jon Barron © 1999-2012 The Baseline of Health Foundation

Systemic Pain Relief

Messing with a successful formula is always a risky proposition, but so is thinking that good enough is good enough.

Back in 2005, I developed a formula which incorporated some extraordinary new research on natural pain relievers—3 substances that not only relieved pain, swelling, and stiffness, but that when used in combination also helped rebuild damaged joints and tissue.

This formula offered a three pronged approach to systemically relieving chronic joint pain and inflammation.

1.It incorporated ASU to increase aggrecan levels, thereby helping to repair and rebuild damaged cartilage in the weight bearing joints.

2.It made use of the unique ability of the undenatured type II chicken collagen found in UC-II™ to train the body's immune system to stop attacking joint cartilage.

3.And it made use of ginger's ability to directly reduce pain and inflammation.

This formula worked so well that even though it was not inexpensive, it became one of the best selling formulas at Baseline Nutritonals, and had one of their highest reorder rates. And on top of that, it not only was successful at relieving pain, it also turned out to be spectacular at protecting against periodontal disease. Which brings up the question: why mess with success?

The answer is that it only worked for about 68% of the people who used it (keeping in mind that glucosamin and chondroitin only work for about 30% of the people who use them). Now economically, 68% is a huge hit for Baseline, but as a formulator, I obsess over the 30% who are being left behind. I realize that nothing will work for 100% of people, but what about 80-85%—rates we see for formulas like my pain oil?

Anyway, ever since the formula was released, I've been looking for ways to improve its rate of effectiveness. One of the problems, of course, with changing a formula is that there's only so much room in a capsule. If you put something new in, you have to take something old out to make room for it. The trick, then, is making sure that the trade off produces a more effective formula, not just a different formula; and after two years of constant experimentation, I've been able to do that with this formula. I've found a way to add two ingredients to the formula that early research indicates may produce an effectiveness rate approaching 80-85%. The two new ingredients are CMO (a special Omega-9 fatty acid variant) and 5-LOXIN® (a very special boswellia serrata extract).

With that in mind, let's look at the formula from top to bottom.

1. Avocado Soy Unsaponifiables (ASU)

In order to understand what ASUs are (apologies to Arizona State University) and how they work, we need to make a minor detour and talk about aggrecan. In fact, this discussion should help tie together some of the supplements that you may already be familiar with. Aggrecan is the acronym for a small bio-chemical molecule called, oxymoronically, the large aggregating chondroitin sulfate proteoglycan.

Specifically, an aggrecan molecule consists of a protein backbone which is attached to up to 150 chondroitin sulfate chains and 60 keratan sulfate chains. Aggrecan is abundant in the human body and represents up to 10% of the dry weight of cartilage—keeping in mind that's quite substantial since articular cartilage (the cartilage found at the end of long bones) contains up to 75% water. As many as 100 of these aggrecan monomers will then interact with hyaluronic acid molecules to form a single massive chain called an aggregate, which is a key component of joint cartilage.

Aggrecan plays a crucial role in the functioning of articular cartilage (the cartilage found in joints), primarily working to maintain high levels of hydration in the cartilage—thereby keeping the cartilage healthy and functional. As a side note, it is the presence in aggrecan of large numbers of chondroitin sulfate chains that is primarily responsible for the osmotic pressure that results in articular cartilage being 75% water.

When at rest, such as sitting down and watching TV, the osmotic swelling in the articular cartilage is at a maximum. However, when walking or standing, the weight of the body is transferred to the articular cartilage found at the ends of the long bones. At this point, your weight compresses the cartilage, literally squeezing water out of it. This continues until the osmotic swelling generates a force equal to the compressive force on the cartilage generated by your weight. When you sit down again (reducing the load), the compressive force is removed, and the cartilage once again swells to its full extent. The more aggrecan present, the better able your body is to perform this function. Note: the reason people supplement with chondroitin sulfate and glucosamine sulfate is actually to increase aggrecan levels.

They are components of aggrecan, and it is aggrecan that lies at the core of cartilage health. But as it turns out, there may be a more efficient way to increase aggrecan levels.

Bottom line: maintaining high levels of aggrecan is essential for optimizing joint health. (As a side note, aggrecan plays a major role in brain and spinal cord development and function too.)

A French Discovery on Osteoarthritis

Several years ago, researchers from the University Hospital in Liege, Belgium reported in the August 2003 issue of The Journal of Rheumatology that a phytosterol/sterolin extract concentrated from the oils found tightly bound to avocado and soybean fibers could significantly boost production of aggrecan, thereby helping slow down and even repair some of the damage caused by osteoarthritis—in as little as nine days.

It should be noted that although eating avocado and soybean oil separately does indeed enhance aggrecan production (somewhat); it is only these special compounds found in ASU extract (made up of one-third avocado and two-thirds soybean unsaponifiables) that restore aggrecan synthesis blocked by the inflammation-causing compound interleukin-1-beta. In addition, ASUs also reduce levels of several other inflammatory factors such as MMP-3 production. In other words, ASU is not the same as avocado and soy oil. It is specially extracted from the fiber of avocados and soy.

The problem is that before extraction, the ASUs are so tightly bound to the fiber, that they are mostly unusable by the human body.

ASU has been sold in Europe in a purified form for several years now as a prescription drug. As such, it has a number of studies supporting its effectiveness. For example, in a double-blind trial, 260 individuals with arthritis of the knee were given either a placebo or purified ASU at 300 or 600 mg daily. The results over 3 months showed that use of ASU significantly improved arthritis symptoms when compared to a placebo.

What It Means for Arthritis

If you've tried Chondroitin sulfate, Glucosamine sulfate, MSM, CMO, whatever, and none of them have worked for you, then ASUs offer an exciting alternative.

Note

To make room for the two new ingredients, I had to pull out some of the ASU.

Previously, I included 1000 mg a day of ASU in the formula. This was approximately three times more than anyone else used in their ASU products, and it definitely improved the effectiveness of the formula—not so much in helping with joint pain, but in its ability to help protect against periodontal disease. In the end, though, the primary purpose of this formula is to help with joint pain, so I decided to drop the ASU down to the commonly used level of 333 mg a day, which allowed me room to add the CMO and 5-Loxin®—thereby significantly increasing the efficacy of the formula when it comes to joint pain with only a small loss in periodontal benefit.

2. UC-II® Undenatured Chicken Collagen

Although ASU works directly to build and repair joint cartilage, it doesn't address a major aspect of the problem (in fact few things address this particular aspect). A key component of most joint destruction (sometimes an initial cause as in rheumatoid arthritis and sometimes a secondary factor triggered by an initial trauma to the tissue as in osteoarthritis) is when the immune system goes out of control and starts attacking the cartilage. In other words, once a person starts down the road of joint pain, either early on or later in the process, at some point the immune system usually "goes wrong" and becomes a factor in the gradual destruction of joint tissue. Literally, the immune system reprograms itself to treat joint tissue as a foreign invader and "eat it up." Re-reprogramming the immune system through the use of immunomodulators is often an essential step in stopping and reversing this damage.

In the past, I have recommended several immunomudulators including CMO (cetyl myristoleate) and L-Carnosine, but UC-II seems to represent a choice uniquely suited to dealing with joint and cartilage problems. Although this discussion ultimately applies to all forms of joint damage, for the moment, let's focus our attention specifically on rheumatoid arthritis.

Rheumatoid Arthritis

Rheumatoid arthritis (RA) is a common autoimmune disease in which killer T-cells of the body's own immune system (most likely triggered by invading bacteria) reprogram themselves to attack joint cartilage, resulting in inflammation and joint destruction. The current treatment strategies of suppressing immunity and inflammation offer only limited success. "Oral tolerance," on the other hand, is a long-recognized mechanism for inducing immune tolerance—that is, suppressing a misdirected immune response.

But rather than suppressing the entire immune system, oral tolerance targets specific immune cells responsible for tissue damage. Inducing the immune system to tolerate joint cartilage, rather than identifying it as a "foreign" substance, requires a specific sequence of events to take place within that part of the immune system found in the gastrointestinal tract lining. Studies have shown that small doses of undenatured type II collagen can indeed trigger this particular sequence of events, thereby deactivating killer T-cell attacks of joint cartilage in humans.Other studies have demonstrated that the undenatured type II chicken collagen found in UC-II retains its activity when exposed to human digestive fluids, which is not necessarily true of other sources. Time-dose measurements by ELISA immuno-assay of UC-II activity have shown that it retains approximately 50% activity even after as long as 90 minutes after exposure to digestive juices.

What is UC-II?

Most type II chicken collagen sold in dietary supplements is denatured, or hydrolyzed, which is another way of saying that the chemicals and high-heat used to process and refine it have changed its molecular configuration. An undenatured extract is made using little or no heat and limited processing.

It is usually extracted using pepsin with just enough processing to concentrate the collagen and make it soluble. Denatured or hydrolyzed extracts, on the other hand, typically use high heat, acids, and enzymes to make the protein molecules more soluble; but these methods fundamentally alter the structure of the protein. Denatured proteins are often called hydrolyzed proteins—thus denatured collagen is often called hydrolyzed collagen. This does not make it useless.

Hydrolzyed type II chicken collagen still has value as a source of some of the components of aggrecan, including collagen itself, hyaluronic acid, chondrotin sulfate, and glucosamine. But to receive this benefit you need to consume it in large amounts, as much as 3-10 grams a day. But more importantly, one significant thing does change in the process of denaturing. When denatured, type II chicken collagen loses its immunomodulating ability. Type II collagen must be in its native (undenatured) form to be effective in this capacity.

UC-II is extracted from chicken sternum cartilage using a patented, low-temperature process that ensures the undenatured biological activity of the type II collagen even when exposed to digestive juices for 90 minutes or more. As mentioned earlier, undenatured collagen administered orally works with the immune system to promote healthy joints by a process called oral tolerization. This process helps the body to differentiate between foreign invaders, such as bacteria, and elements that are good for the body, such as nutrients.

The process of oral tolerization takes place in the small intestine where food is absorbed. Through a complex process, lymphoid tissue in the mucosal lining of the small intestine screens incoming compounds and serves as a "switch," turning the body's immune response on or off to foreign substances, depending upon what that substance is. In the case of undenatured type II chicken collagen, small amounts (typically around 10 milligrams) taken orally have been shown to correct a faulty immune response specifically targeted at the type II collagen present in bone joint cartilage—in effect, modulating the body's immune response so it works correctly once again. At a cost of over $17,000 per kilogram of active ingredient, UC-II is undoubtedly the single most expensive ingredient I have ever used in a formula.

Fortunately, it only takes 10 mg a day of its active ingredient for maximum effect. (In fact, it loses effectiveness if too much is used, losing all effectiveness at levels over 20 mg a day). But cost aside, the fact that it specifically addresses the problem of the immune system destroying the body's own cartilage mandates its inclusion in the formula.

Studies on Joint Mobility and Flexibility

There have been a number of studies conducted with UC-II on both animals and humans, including research at the Harvard University Medical school—all of which have shown that the undenatured type II chicken collagen found in UC-II effectively reprograms the immune system to promote healthy joints and increase joint mobility and flexibility.

In a pilot clinical study, for example, 5 older women (58-78 years old) suffering from significant joint pain were given undenatured type II chicken collagen (10 mg/day) for 42 days. Improvements in pain reduction and joint flexibility were reported, along with reduced morning stiffness. In another study, researchers at Harvard Medical School found that six of ten rheumatoid arthritis patients taking undenatured type II collagen for three months showed substantial improvement, while one patient recovered completely. In addition, there were no side effects. And finally, in a 90-day, double-blind, placebo-controlled, follow-up study on patients with severe rheumatoid arthritis, Harvard scientists found that 28 patients taking undenatured type II collagen showed significant improvement compared to the placebo group, while four patients recovered completely.

An Important Note on Supplement Amounts

When we talk about a 10 mg dose, we're talking about 10 mg of active glycosylated undenatured type II chicken collagen. But there are no readily available pure sources of this component. Standard hydrolyzed chicken collagen, as explained earlier, has virtually none. And most sources of undenatured collagen offer it in the range of 10-25% concentrations. In UC-II, for example, active glycosylated undenatured type II chicken collagen comprises 25% of the whole. That means it takes 40 mg a day of UC-II to get 10 mg of active undenatured collagen. I have noticed that several of the supplement providers who are using UC-II in their formulas have mistakenly used 10 mg of UC-II itself. That means they are only providing 2.5 mg of active undenatured collagen. Given the cost, I can see why, but from your perspective, you want a full 10 mg, which requires 40 mg a day of UC-II—or more from other sources.

What It Means

For anyone suffering from progressive cartilage damage (which ultimately means anyone suffering from rheumatoid arthritis or long term osteoarthritis), reprogramming the immune system with undenatured type II chicken collagen as found in UC-II is an essential component of his or her joint repair regimen.

3. Ginger

There are two cyclo-oxygenase (COX) enzymes present in the human body, COX-1 and COX-2. The COX-1 enzyme is found in most tissues and is necessary for a variety of important internal functions, such as protecting the stomach lining, maintaining renovascular function and platelet aggregation. The COX-2 enzyme, though, has an entirely different function. It is a necessary component of the inflammation process, which is a normal, healthy attempt by the body to heal itself. However, when inflammation gets out of control (such as in the case of arthritis or other chronic inflammatory disorders), ongoing pain and discomfort is the result. Prescription COX-2 inhibitors such as Vioxx and Celebrex have proven helpful in relieving out of control inflammation and its accompanying pain—but with notable side effects such as an increased risk of heart attacks and strokes. That's where botanical COX-2 inhibitors such as ginger can help. Botanical COX-2 inhibitors block the action of the COX-2 enzyme in much the same way as prescription drugs do, but without the side effects.

Although it's probably better known for its anti-nausea properties, ginger is also an effective COX-2 inhibiting anti-inflammatory herb that has historically been used for arthritis and rheumatism. In a study of patients with rheumatoid arthritis, osteoarthritis, and muscular discomfort, the majority of those who received ginger experienced, to varying degrees, relief of pain and swelling. None of the patients reported adverse effects during the period of ginger consumption, which ranged from three months to 2.5 years. Another double blind trial found ginger extract to be effective at relieving pain in people with osteoarthritis of the hip or knee. Likewise, in another double blind study, ginger was significantly more effective than a placebo in pain relief and overall improvement.

Ginger contains very potent anti-inflammatory compounds called gingerols. These substances explain why so many people with osteoarthritis or rheumatoid arthritis experience reductions in their pain levels and improvements in their mobility when they consume ginger regularly. In two clinical studies involving patients who responded to conventional drugs and those who didn't, physicians found that 75% of arthritis patients and 100% of patients with muscular discomfort experienced relief of pain and/or swelling.

A twelve month placebo-controlled, double-blind, crossover study published in Osteoarthritis Cartilage magazine (no really, that's its name) tracked 29 patients with painful arthritis in the knee (6 men and 23 women ranging in age from 42-85 years). By the end of the first six months, those given ginger were experiencing significantly less pain on movement and handicap than those given placebo. Pain on movement decreased from a score of 76.14 at baseline to 41.00, while handicap decreased from 73.47 to 46.08. In contrast, those who were switched from ginger to placebo experienced an increase in pain of movement (up to 82.10) and handicap (up to 80.80) from baseline. In the final phase of the study when all patients were getting ginger, pain remained low in those already taking ginger in phase 2, and decreased again in the group that had been on placebo.

Not only did participants' subjective experiences of pain lessen, but swelling in their knees, an objective measurement of lessened inflammation, dropped significantly in those treated with ginger. The mean target knee circumference in those taking ginger dropped from 43.25cm when the study began to 39.36cm by the 12th week. When this group was switched to placebo in the second phase of the study, their knee circumferences increased, while those who had been on placebo but were now switched to ginger experienced a decrease in knee circumference. In the final phase, when both groups were given ginger, mean knee circumference continued to drop, reaching lows of 38.78 and 36.38 in the two groups.

What It Means

Ginger extract helps to relieve chronic pain by reducing inflammation.

4. CMO (cetyl myristoleate)

Cetyl myristoleate (CMO) is the common name for cis-9-cetyl myristoleate. (You can think of it as a relative of the Omega-9 fatty acid found in olive oil.) It is a completely natural medium chain fatty acid found in certain animals, including cows, whales, beavers, and mice—but not in people. CMO was discovered in 1972 by Harry W. Diehl, Ph.D., a researcher at the National Institutes of Health. At the time, Dr. Diehl was responsible for testing anti-inflammatory drugs on lab animals. In order for him to test the drugs, he first had to artificially induce arthritis in the animals by injecting a heat-killed bacterium called Freund's adjuvant. Dr. Diehl discovered that Swiss albino mice did not get arthritis after injection of Freund's adjuvant. Eventually, he was able to determine that cetyl myristoleate was the factor present naturally in mice that was responsible for this protection. When CMO was injected into various strains of rats, it offered the same protection against arthritis. There have been three notable studies on humans.

Studies

The first double blind study was conducted in 1997 under the auspices of the Joint European Hospital Studies Program. Of the 106 people who received cetyl myristoleate, 63% showed improvement vs just 15% for the 226 people in the placebo group.

In 2001, a study of 1814 arthritis patients found that over 87% of the subjects in the study had greater than 50% recovery and over 65% of those showed from 75% - 100% recovery following a sixteen day regimen. All types of arthritis were positively affected by CMO. Only those subjects with liver damage or digestive problems or those taking immune suppressing medications were not helped.

In 2002, a double blind study of 64 people with chronic knee pain, published in the Journal of Rheumatology, concluded that CMO provided a significant functional improvement in range of motion vs placebo. In fact, the study concluded that CMO “may be an alternative to the use of nonsteroidal antiinflammatory drugs for the treatment of osteoarthritis."

What It Means

The 500 mg of CMO I added to the formula provides four distinct benefits:

1.It serves as a lubricant for the joints and muscles, virtually equivalent to silicone in its effectiveness.

2.It facilitates the rebuilding of cartilage.

3.It functions as an immunomodulator—helping to stop an errant immune system from attacking joint cartilage.

4.It functions like a fatty acid in that it mediates inflammatory processes.

5. 5-LOXIN®

Dried extracts of boswellia serrata have been used since the dawn of history to treat inflammatory conditions. (Note: the common name for boswellia is frankincense. It's not an accident that it was one of the biblical gifts of the Magi.) Over the last few years, boswellia has attracted much attention in the world medical community because it possesses anti-inflammatory properties that are equal to prescription medications without the unpleasant/dangerous side effects. For example, research conducted in India found that an extract of boswellia was more beneficial for rheumatoid arthritis and less toxic and more potent than the standard drug of choice at the time, benzoyl hydrotropic acid.

Other research

In animal studies, dogs suffering from osteoarthritis received boswellia extract once daily for six weeks. After just two weeks, 71% of the animals showed significant improvement in clinical symptoms of arthritis, including reduced pain, stiffness, and lameness.

In a human study, boswellia was similarly shown to be effective in adults with osteoarthritis. Thirty subjects with osteoarthritis of the knee took part in a 16-week, randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial. All of those who took a boswellia supplement reported less pain and swelling, increased knee flexion, and the ability to walk a greater distance.

But it's not just arthritis. Boswellia seems to have the ability to reduce all forms of inflammation. In studies, bronchial asthma was reduced in 70% of 40 patients treated with 300 mg three times daily for 6 weeks in a double-blind trial. It has also proven effective in helping control the inflammation associated with Crohn's disease and colitis.

How it works

Boswellia works through entirely different mechanisms than anti-inflammatory drugs. Whereas most drugs function as Cox enzyme inhibitors, boswellia works by inhibiting lipoxygenase enzymes (LOX), which are powerful contributors to inflammation and disease. By inhibiting LOS enzymes, boswellia effectively blocks leukotriene synthesis.

Leukotrienes play a major role in promoting a whole host of age-associated, inflammation-related diseases including joint problems, intestinal disorders, cancer, and lung related disease.

In addition, it appears that boswellia can inhibit the breakdown of connective tissues caused by tumor necrosis factor-alpha, a potent inflammatory agent in the body.

And finally, it appears that boswellia has the ability to modulate the immune system and inhibit inflammatory activity, thereby helping with a number of autoimmune conditions, including rheumatoid arthritis.

Or to put it in simpler terms, the boswellic acids in boswellia seem to have the ability to suppress the proliferating tissue found in inflamed areas of the body and prevent the concomitant breakdown of connective tissue. In addition, boswellia has been found to improve blood supply to the joints and restore the integrity of weakened blood vessels, again with no side effects as seen with the traditional drugs of choice.

What It Means

Boswellia is a great herb for helping with inflammation related conditions—with two caveats.

• Quality is erratic.
• And even with standardized extracts, it takes a lot (1-3 grams per day) to get the desired effect.

Which brings us to 5-LOXIN.

5-LOXIN is a new, patent-pending boswellia extract that provides 30% acetyl-11-keto-beta boswellic acid (the most bio-active compound found in boswellia) at levels ten times more concentrated than ordinary extrracts. It allows us to use much lower dosages of boswellia (100 mg) while achieving much greater results. As an added bonus, 5-LOXIN has been shown to inhibit matrix metalloproteinase (MMP's), a class of enzymes that plays a role in breaking down cartilage, collagen, and connective tissues—and is a major contributor to certain forms of heart disease.

Conclusion on Chronic Joint Pain

This formula now offers a five pronged approach to systemically relieving chronic joint pain and inflammation.

• It incorporates ASU to increase aggrecan levels, thereby helping to repair and rebuild damaged cartilage in the weight bearing joints.

• It makes use of the unique ability of the undenatured type II chicken collagen found in UC-II™ to retrain the body's immune system to stop attacking joint cartilage.

• It makes use of ginger's ability to directly reduce pain and inflammation.

• It makes use of CMO's ability to lubricate joints, to support the rebuilding of cartilage, and stop the immune system from attacking joint tissue.

• And it makes use of the ability of 5-LOXIN to nutritionally support the body's inflammation control mechansims.

Things to Take with this Formula

Immune boosters and pathogen destroyers. Once again, the "scientific community" is years late in acknowledging the commonly known fact that, in most cases, joint pain is related to a compromised immune system. Take rheumatoid arthritis, for example. The Journal of Clinical Pathology has finally endorsed what the Mayo Clinic demonstrated conclusively years ago: that bacteria are involved. And new research is indicating that mycoplasma infections may be responsible for as much as 50% of all chronic disease, including arthritis.

Glucosamine is not a cure, but for some people 1,000-2,000 mg a day may provide some relief.

Studies are decidedly mixed, but if it works for you, that's all that counts.
Systemic proteolytic enzymes can be remarkably effective in reducing inflammation throughout the body. Reducing the imflammation can go a long way in stopping the damge from progressing any further—in addition to reducing the pain.

Omega-3 fatty acids as found in fish and krill oil are also helpful in reducing inflammation.

MSM is a naturally occuring sulfur compound found in our bodies and in many foods. When taken as a supplement, it can play a major role in reducing joint inflammation.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=fvwp&NR=1&v=6YREaWwdxPM